U.S. President Donald Trump on Tuesday suggested that displaced Palestinians in Gaza be “permanently” resettled outside the war-torn territory.
Trump made the provocative comments at the beginning of his meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on the White House, where the 2 leaders are expected to debate the delicate ceasefire and hostage deal within the Israeli-Hamas conflict.
“I don’t think people must be going back,” Trump said. “You’ll be able to’t live in Gaza at once. I believe we want one other location. I believe it must be a location that’s going to make people completely happy.”
Trump’s comments got here as he and top advisers made the case that a three-to-five-year timeline for reconstruction of the war-torn territory, as specified by a brief truce agreement, shouldn’t be viable.
The president has previously called on Egypt and Jordan to resettle Gazans. Each countries have flatly rejected such proposals.
But Trump said he believes each countries—in addition to other countries which he didn’t name—will ultimately agree to soak up Palestinians.
“You look over the a long time, it’s all death in Gaza,” Trump said. “This has been happening for years. It’s all death. If we will get a stupendous area to resettle people, permanently, in nice homes where they might be completely happy and never be shot and never be killed and never be knifed to death like what’s happening in Gaza.”
The White House’s give attention to the longer term of Gaza’s greater than 2 million residents comes because the nascent truce between Israel and Hamas hangs within the balance.
Netanyahu is facing competing pressure from his right-wing coalition to finish a brief truce against Hamas militants in Gaza and from war-weary Israelis who want the remaining hostages home and for the 15-month conflict to finish.
The leaders said their talks would cover a long-sought Israel-Saudi Arabia normalization deal and shared concerns about Iran’s nuclear program, as well the second phase of the hostage deal.
Trump continues to press for relocating Palestinians from Gaza even after each Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi and Jordanian King Abdullah II last publicly dismissed the thought.
Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, the Palestinian Authority and the Arab League also joined Egypt and Jordan in rejecting plans to maneuver Palestinians out of their territories in Gaza and the occupied West Bank.
Yet Trump could also be betting he can persuade Egypt and Jordan to come back around to simply accept displaced Palestinians due to significant aid that the U.S. provides Cairo and Amman. Hard-line right-wing members of Netanyahu’s government have embraced the decision to maneuver displaced Palestinians out of Gaza.
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“To me, it’s unfair to elucidate to Palestinians that they could be back in five years,” Trump’s Mideast envoy, Steve Witkoff, told reporters. “That’s just preposterous.”
Trump also signaled that he could also be reconsidering an independent Palestinian state as a part of a broader two-state solution to the decades-long Israel-Palestinian conflict. “Well, plenty of plans change with time,” he told reporters when asked if he was still committed to a plan just like the one he specified by 2020 that called for a Palestinian state.
“A number of death has occurred since I left and now got here back,” Trump said. “Now we’re faced with a situation that’s different — in some ways higher and in some ways worse. But we’re faced with a really complex and difficult situation that we’ll solve.”
Netanyahu’s arrival in Washington for the primary foreign leader visit of Trump’s second term comes because the prime minister’s popular support is lagging.
The prime minister is in the midst of weekslong testimony in an ongoing corruption trial that centers on allegations he exchanged favors with media moguls and wealthy associates. He has decried the accusations and said he’s the victim of a “witch hunt.”
Being seen with Trump, who’s popular in Israel, could help distract the general public from the trial and boost Netanyahu’s standing.
“We now have the suitable leader of Israel who’s done an awesome job,” Trump said of Netanyahu.
Netanyahu also praised Trump’s leadership in getting the hostage and ceasefire deal. “I’ll just let you know, I’m completely happy they’re here,” Netanyahu said of Trump and his administration.
It’s Netanyahu’s first travel outside Israel since the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants in November for him, his former defense minister and Hamas’ slain military chief, accusing them of crimes against humanity through the war in Gaza. The U.S. doesn’t recognize the ICC’s authority over its residents or territory.
Netanyahu met with White House national security adviser Mike Waltz and Witkoff on Monday to start the daunting work of brokering the following phase of a ceasefire agreement.
Netanyahu said in an announcement that the meeting with Witkoff and Waltz was “positive and friendly.”
The Israeli leader said he would send a delegation to Qatar to proceed indirect talks with Hamas which are being mediated by the Gulf Arab country, the primary confirmation that those negotiations would proceed. Netanyahu also said he would convene his security Cabinet to debate Israel’s demands for the following phase of the ceasefire when he returns to Israel at the tip of the week.
Witkoff, meanwhile, said he plans to fulfill with Qatar’s prime minister, Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, in Florida on Thursday to debate the following phase within the ceasefire. Qatar and Egypt have served as key intermediaries with Hamas throughout the conflict.
Netanyahu is under intense pressure from hard-right members of his governing coalition to desert the ceasefire and resume fighting in Gaza to eliminate Hamas. Bezalel Smotrich, one in every of Netanyahu’s key partners, vows to topple the federal government if the war isn’t relaunched, a step that could lead on to early elections.
Hamas, which has reasserted control over Gaza for the reason that ceasefire began last month, has said it should not release hostages within the second phase without an end to the war and Israeli forces’ full withdrawal. Netanyahu, meanwhile, maintains that Israel is committed to victory over Hamas and the return of all hostages captured within the Oct. 7, 2023 attack that triggered the war.
Einav Zangauker, whose son Matan is among the many hostages, called on Trump to make use of American leverage to maintain Netanyahu committed to the agreement.
Matan, 24, is amongst those that are expected to be included within the second phase of the deal, when all remaining living hostages — including men under the age of fifty and male soldiers — are to be exchanged for a yet-to-be-determined variety of Palestinian prisoners. The second phase can be expected to incorporate the complete withdrawal of Israeli troops from Gaza.
“I need President Trump to know there are specific extreme elements from inside Israel who are attempting to torpedo his vision,” said Zangauker, who traveled to Washington from Israel to affix a planned Tuesday rally outside the White House. “We’re representative of the vast, overwhelming majority of Israel. The ultra-extremists are blackmailing the prime minister to do their bidding.”
The prime minister can be expected use the visit to press Trump to take decisive motion on Iran. Tehran has faced a series of military setbacks, including Israeli forces significantly degrading Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah militants in Lebanon in addition to an operation that decimated Iran’s air defenses. The moment, Netanyahu believes, has created a window to decisively address Tehran’s nuclear program.
Ahead of his meeting with Netanyahu, Trump signed an executive order that he said would increase economic pressure on Iran.
“We’re not going to permit them to have a nuclear weapon,” Trump said.
Goldenberg reported from Tel Aviv, Israel. Associated Press author Melanie Lidman in Jerusalem contributed reporting.
