Trump has just proposed to take over Gaza, transfer its denizens to Arab states, and convert it into a scintillating Riviera.
I never support ethnic cleansing.
But the facts are important here: only 30% of the population of Gaza is local. More than 70% are refugees from the erstwhile territory of Palestine (now the State of Israel).
Both Israel and Egypt regard Gaza as a serious security threat and a cesspool of Islamic extremism. Gaza is economically dependent on handouts from Israel, Egypt, and Qatar.
In short: Gaza is not a viable geopolitical, political, or geopolitical entity.
Having said that, emptying Gaza of its current population is unthinkable because the territory is and has always been widely perceived as an integral part of the Palestinian state in a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Trump’s wild offer will undermine such an arrangement and will leave Israel as an occupying force in the West Bank indefinitely.
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