Trump proposes Jordan, Egypt take in Gazans and ‘we just clean out’ decimated Strip
Testing regional taboo, US president suggests Arab nations help ‘build housing where they can live in peace for a change,’ says he raised issue with Abdullah, plans to do so with Sissi

US President Donald Trump said Saturday he’d like to see Jordan, Egypt and other Arab nations increase the number of Palestinian refugees they are accepting from the Gaza Strip — potentially moving out enough of the population to “just clean out” the war-torn area and create a virtual clean slate.
The proposal has to date been a red line for Arab states, particularly Jordan and Egypt, which have viewed the mass migration of Palestinians to their countries as a potential existential threat. They have pointed to Israel’s refusal to publicly commit to allowing any Palestinians who leave the Strip to later return, and don’t want to be seen as complicit in an exile of Palestinians.
The fear of being unable to return has also deterred many Palestinians from leaving. Some did try during the war that began on October 7, 2023, when Hamas-led terrorists invaded southern Israel, slaughtered some 1,200 people and abducted 251. Over 100,000 Gazans succeeded in entering Egypt, though they were forced to pay exorbitant fees in order to do so and have largely not received any assistance upon arrival, as Cairo refuses to recognize them as refugees.
The Biden administration also considered the idea of temporarily relocating some of the population early on in the war, as it sought to move Palestinians out of harm’s way, but so adamant were Jordan and Egypt in their refusal that it quickly shelved the notion.
But Trump, known for often snubbing traditional foreign policy norms, sought to bring back the idea of mass Palestinian migration to neighboring countries on Saturday as his new administration tries to sustain the nascent ceasefire in Gaza and plan for the Strip’s reconstruction, while over two million people remain in a territory overwhelmingly destroyed by the past 15 months of war.

During a 20-minute question-and-answer session with reporters aboard Air Force One, Trump described Gaza as a “demolition site” after the Israel-Hamas war. He said he had spoken to Jordan’s King Abdullah II about the issue and expected to talk to Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi on Sunday.
The White House readout on the call with the Jordanian monarch was light on details, saying the pair “discussed the importance of regional peace, security, and stability.”
Trump filled in some of the details on Air Force One, saying he had told Abdullah, “I’d love you to take on more because I’m looking at the whole Gaza Strip right now and it’s a mess, it’s a real mess. I’d like him to take people.”
When asked if this was a temporary or long-term suggestion, Trump said: “Could be either.”
“You’re talking about probably a million and half people, and we just clean out that whole thing. You know, over the centuries it’s had many, many conflicts, that site. And I don’t know, something has to happen,” Trump said.
In October, during his presidential campaign, the former real estate developer said that war-torn Gaza could be “better than Monaco” if it were “rebuilt the right way.”
“It’s literally a demolition site right now. Almost everything is demolished and people are dying there,” Trump said in his Saturday comments. “So I’d rather get involved with some of the Arab nations and build housing at a different location where they can maybe live in peace for a change.”

Israeli far-right leaders celebrated Trump’s comments.
Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said in a statement Sunday: “After 76 years during which the majority of Gaza’s population has been forcibly kept in harsh conditions to preserve the aspiration of destroying the State of Israel, the idea of helping them find other places to start new, better lives is an excellent idea.
“For years, politicians have proposed impractical solutions like dividing the land and establishing a Palestinian state, which endangered the existence and security of the world’s only Jewish state, leading only to bloodshed and suffering for many. Only out-of-the-box thinking and new solutions will bring about peace and security,” he added.
“With God’s help, I will work with the prime minister and the cabinet to develop an operational plan to implement this as soon as possible.”
And Otzma Yehudit party leader Itamar Ben Gvir, whose party quit the coalition last week over the ceasefire in Gaza, said: “One of our demands from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is to promote voluntary emigration. When the president of the world’s greatest superpower, Trump, personally brings up this idea, it is worth the Israeli government implementing it — promote emigration now!”

But Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi said on Sunday that his kingdom firmly rejects any forced displacement of Palestinians.
“Our rejection of the displacement of Palestinians is firm and will not change. Jordan is for Jordanians and Palestine is for Palestinians,” Safadi said in a statement.
The Indonesia plan
The Trump administration seemed to be entertaining from the get-go the idea of temporarily relocating Gazans. However, the country in mind appeared to be Indonesia. Several days before Trump’s inauguration, NBC News reported that the transition team was considering relocating some of Gaza’s two million people to the Southeast Asia nation.
Indonesia’s Foreign Minister Sugiono became one of the first counterparts to receive a phone call from US Secretary of State Marco Rubio last week, during which the latter “welcomed Indonesia’s willingness to engage on Middle East peace and post-conflict reconstruction,” a US readout on the call said.
Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto said last year that his country was willing to send peacekeeping troops to enforce a ceasefire in Gaza if required.
The Times of Israel revealed in 2021 that the first Trump administration was on the verge of brokering a normalization deal between Israel and Indonesia, but ran out of time before the end of its term.
For Palestinians, any attempt to move them from Gaza would evoke dark historical memories of what the Arab world calls the “Nakba” or catastrophe — the mass displacement of Palestinians during the war surrounding Israel’s creation 75 years ago, when several Arab armies attacked the nascent Jewish state.

Israel has denied having any plans to force Gazans to move. But some far-right members of the Israeli government have publicly supported the idea of Gazans leaving the Palestinian territory en masse.
Trump has offered non-traditional views on the future of Gaza in the past. He suggested after he was inaugurated last week that Gaza has “really got to be rebuilt differently.”
The returning president added then, “Gaza is interesting. It’s a phenomenal location, on the sea. The best weather, you know, everything is good. It’s like, some beautiful things could be done with it, but it’s very interesting.”
Sen. Lindsay Graham, a Trump ally, was asked on CNN’s “State of the Union” about what Trump meant with his remark about Palestinians. “You know, I really don’t know,” he said.
“The idea that all the Palestinians are going to leave and go somewhere else, I don’t see that to be overly practical,” Graham said. He added, though, that Trump should keep talking to Mideast leaders, including Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and officials in the United Arab Emirates and Egypt.
“I don’t know what he’s talking about. But go talk to MBS, go talk to UAE, go talk to Egypt,” Graham said. “What is their plan for the Palestinians? Do they want them all to leave?”
Trump’s son-in-law and former White House employee Jared Kushner suggested last February that Israel empty Gaza of civilians to unlock the potential of its “waterfront property.”
Trump has celebrated the first phase of a ceasefire between Hamas and Israel that began last week, pausing the fighting and seeing the release of some hostages held by Hamas in Gaza in return for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners held by Israel. Negotiations have yet to begin in earnest on the more difficult second phase of the deal that, if agreed, would eventually see the release of all hostages held by Hamas and an enduring halt to the fighting.