Aftershocks reverberated Wednesday from President Trump’s declaration the previous day that the United States should take “long-term ownership” of Gaza and that the Palestinians who live there should be moved.
The position, outlined during the visit of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, threatened to upend the framework of U.S. policy in the region, which has been based around the hypothetical possibility of a two-state solution, in which Israel and an independent Palestine would co-exist.
Trump caused further consternation across much of the political spectrum — and in the wider world — when he declined to rule out using the U.S. military in this effort.
Asked about that point, he said, “We’ll do what is necessary.”
Here are the five big takeaways 24 hours later.
Details are notable by their absence
If Trump really plans to follow through on his proposal, it will be an enormous — and vastly controversial — undertaking.
As of Wednesday evening, there were still very few details on how specifically it would be accomplished.
Trump had said Tuesday he believed “all” of the Palestinians should be moved.
How would that be accomplished? Why would it be realistic to assume a people who have clung so fiercely to their national identity would submit to abandoning their homeland?
If they do not do so voluntarily, would American troops be placed in harm’s way to force them out?
None of that was clear.
It appears the White House believes that neighboring nations — notably Egypt and Jordan — could be induced to take in Palestinian refugees, perhaps by leveraging U.S. aid payments.
But there are clear risks for the rulers of those nations in acquiescing in such a plan.
Those risks center on potential rage at home if the rulers are seen as colluding in the destruction of a discrete Palestinian people — as well as the capacity of an influx of Palestinian activists to cause internal instability.
White House walks back permanent provision
Trump had indicated during his remarks on Tuesday that Palestinians in Gaza could be resettled permanently in some other location.
The suggestion of permanence underscored the danger from an Arab perspective, given how central the notion of dispossession is to Palestinian identity.
Many Palestinians were uprooted from their homes at Israel’s creation in 1948, and Israel has occupied the West Bank since 1967.
Trump also said he thought the United States should take a “long-term ownership position” over Gaza.
But on Wednesday, the White House did a measure of back-pedaling on the issue.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio characterized the idea of displacing the Palestinians as a temporary measure while Gaza was rebuilt.
“In the interim, obviously people are going to have to live somewhere while you’re rebuilding it,” Rubio told a news conference in Guatemala City, according to The Associated Press.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt, pressed on the question during Wednesday’s media briefing, said of Gaza’s population that Trump had “made it clear that they need to be temporarily relocated out of Gaza for the rebuilding of this effort.”
Those comments are the first concrete sign that the administration is backing off at least some elements of the proposal.
A deluge of criticism from Democrats and others
Democrats reacted with fury to Trump’s proposal, with some describing his plan for the displacement of Palestinians — potentially at the hands of U.S. troops — as ethnic cleansing.
Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), who is Palestinian American, accused Trump of being able to “only spew this fanatical bulls‑‑‑” because of what Tlaib characterized as “bipartisan support in Congress for funding genocide and ethnic cleansing.”
Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) said Trump had “completely lost it” and suggested that his plan, if enacted, would “set the Middle East on fire for 20 years.”
Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) accused the president of pursuing “ethnic cleaning by another name,” while Rep. Al Green (D-Texas) pledged to bring articles of impeachment against Trump over the proposal.
There was also criticism from Arab nations, including Saudi Arabia. A statement from the kingdom’s foreign ministry called its commitment to Palestinian statehood “firm, steadfast and unwavering.”
Even many Republicans sound lukewarm
Trump has the GOP firmly in his grip after last November’s comfortable election victory. So it is always notable when a significant number of members of his own party appear tepid about his plans.
That certainly seems to be the case here, perhaps because Trump has reoriented the party around a broadly anti-interventionist, “America First” stance.
Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) wrote on social media: “I thought we voted for America First. We have no business contemplating yet another occupation to doom our treasure and spill our soldiers blood.”
But the libertarian-leaning Paul was not the only Republican to express misgivings.
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said that most people in his state were “probably not excited about sending Americans to take over Gaza.”
Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) struck a similar tone, saying it was not “the best use of United States resources to spend a bunch of money in Gaza.”
To be sure, Trump’s plan had its GOP boosters.
Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) told his home state Journal Sentinel that the Middle East could benefit from “bold new ideas” and that Trump’s proposal was “paradigm-shifting.”
That said, the lack of enthusiasm from other quarters was notable.
Plan renews focus on Trump’s family connections
Amid the initial shock caused by Trump’s proposals Tuesday evening, some observers noted how his plan echoed an earlier comment from his son-in-law Jared Kushner.
Last year, Kushner — a real-estate developer like Trump — caused controversy of his own when he said that Gaza’s “waterfront property” had the potential to be “very valuable.”
Kushner, speaking roughly four months into the Israeli assault on Gaza that followed the Hamas attacks of Oct. 7, 2023, added that it was “a little bit of an unfortunate situation there, but from Israel’s perspective I would do my best to move the people out and then clean it up.”
On Wednesday, The New York Times turned its attention to the Trump family’s business dealings in the region.
“The Middle East has in the past three years turned into the hottest spot for the Trump family in terms of new international real-estate deals,” the Times reported.
It noted that these included recent agreements with a Saudi-based company to “build high-risk luxury apartments, golf courses or hotels in Oman, Saudi Arabia and Dubai.”
The report also reminded readers that Kushner spearheads a private equity firm “that has raised $4.5 billion, mostly from sovereign wealth funds of the oil-rich nations of Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates.”
