U.S. President Donald Trump on Saturday called on Arab nations, singling out Egypt and Jordan, to take in more Palestinians from Gaza to “clean out” the enclave, which suffered extensive damage during the 15-month Israel-Hamas War.
Speaking to reporters aboard Air Force One, Trump said, “I’d like Egypt to take people,” according to the Associated Press. “You’re talking about probably a million and a half people, and we just clean out that whole thing and say, ‘You know, it’s over.’”
“Something has to happen. It’s literally a demolition site right now. Almost everything’s demolished, and people are dying there,” he continued.
“So, I’d rather get involved with some of the Arab nations, and build housing in a different location, where they can maybe live in peace for a change.”
The relocation “could be temporary or long term,” he added, according to AP.
He praised Jordan’s previous acceptance of Palestinian refugees and expressed interest in expanding this approach. “I’d love for you to take on more, cause I’m looking at the whole Gaza Strip right now, and it’s a mess. It’s a real mess,” Trump said he had told Jordan’s King Abdullah II during a recent conversation.
During the press conference, Trump also disclosed that he had lifted restrictions on sending 2,000-pound bombs to Israel. “We released them today,” he said, according to the report. When asked why, he replied: “Because they bought them.”
The decision to resume the shipments marks a departure from his predecessor’s policy. President Joe Biden had suspended the delivery of these weapons in May to discourage an Israeli offensive in Rafah. “Civilians have been killed in Gaza as a consequence of those bombs and other ways in which they go after population centers,” Biden told CNN in May.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office has not responded to Trump’s comments.
Opposition politician Itamar Ben-Gvir, whose Otzma Yehudit Party quit the government last week in protest against the ceasefire with Hamas, praised Trump’s proposal to “transfer residents from Gaza to Jordan and Egypt.”
“One of our demands from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is to encourage voluntary emigration,” Ben-Gvir said on Sunday morning. “When the president of the biggest superpower, Trump, raises the idea himself, it would be wise for the Israeli government to implement it.”
“Encourage emigration now!” the right-wing politician concluded.
Jordan and Egypt have repeatedly made clear that they will not accept any Palestinian civilians from the Gaza Strip, declaring it a “red line.”
“There will be no refugees in Jordan and no refugees in Egypt,” Jordan’s King Abdullah II declared following a meeting with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz in October 2023.
“That is a red line, because I think that is a plan by certain of the usual suspects to try and create de facto issues on the ground,” he added.
Egyptian sources have also dismissed proposals to allow Gazans to flee, with one saying they would not allow them to leave so as to protect “the right of Palestinians to hold on to their cause and their land.”