Since taking office on 20th January 2025, President Trump has issued dozens of executive orders and made numerous announcements in relation to foreign affairs and defence matters. His recent proposal on Gaza can be ranked as one of the most irresponsible and dangerous among these.
Appearing with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at a news conference in the White House on Tuesday 4th February, Trump stated that the United States would “take over” and “own” Gaza and turn it into “the Riviera of the Middle East”.1
According to Trump’s takeover plan, Palestinians in Gaza, estimated to number 2.3 million, would be permanently resettled in neighbouring countries. Jordan and Egypt, two regimes that rely heavily on US economic and military support for their very survival, together with Saudi Arabia, were identified as likely host countries in this illegal and immoral resettlement scheme.
On the implementation of his proposal, Trump indicated that Israel would hand control of Gaza over to the US, once Israeli military operations in the besieged enclave ceased. Further, he did not rule out dispatching US troops to secure Gaza, saying: “As far as Gaza is concerned, we’ll do what is necessary. If it’s necessary, we’ll do that.”
Trump’s proposal, based on radically violating foundational rules that underpin international law, was topped off with the blatant falsehood that Palestinians would “love to leave Gaza”, telling reporters: “I would think that they would be thrilled.”
Ethnic cleansing by another name
In commenting on Trump’s proposal, Professor Ben Saul, Challis Chair of International Law at the University of Sydney, made the following observation:
Under humanitarian law it is a war crime to forcibly displace the civilian population of occupied territory. That rule was adopted after WW2 precisely to stop what Nazi Germany had been doing all over Europe particularly in Eastern Europe when it wanted to take over other people’s land, take their resources and get rid of their people and what Donald trump is proposing is no different – it’s ethnic cleansing by another name.2
International responses
Condemnation of Trump’s proposal by the United Nations, Palestinians and world leaders has been swift and unequivocal.3
United Nations
When addressing a UN committee meeting on the exercise of the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people a day after Trump’s announcement, Secretary General, António Guterres, warned against any form of ethnic cleansing in Gaza. “In the search for solutions, we must not make the problem worse”, the UN chief said. He emphasised that any durable peace will require “tangible, irreversible and permanent” progress toward the two-state solution as well as the establishment of an ”independent Palestinian state with Gaza as an integral part.”
Palestine
Officials from Hamas and the Palestinian Authority immediately rejected Trump’s proposal. Also, Riyad Mansour, leader of the Palestinian delegation to the United Nations, said people in Gaza should be allowed to reclaim what were once their homes in Israel. “For those who want to send the Palestinian people to a ‘nice place’, allow them to go back to their original homes in what is now Israel,” he said, alluding to Trump’s language. “The Palestinian people want to rebuild Gaza because this is where we belong.”
Jordan
On the day after Trump made his announcement, Jordan’s King Abdullah said that he rejected any attempts to annex land and displace Palestinians.
Saudi Arabia
Similarly, in a statement released Wednesday morning, Saudi Arabia’s Foreign Minister said: “The kingdom of Saudi Arabia also stresses what it had previously announced regarding its absolute rejection of infringement on the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people, whether through Israeli settlement policies, annexation of Palestinian lands or efforts to displace the Palestinian people from their land.”4
Egypt
While Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi has not publicly responded to Trump’s proposal, Egypt reportedly launched a behind-the-scenes diplomatic push in an effort to head off Trump’s plan.
Europe
Many European countries have also adamantly rejected Trump’s proposal. These countries include: Germany, France, Spain, Ireland, Italy and Britain.
In his first major public break with the Trump administration, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer told the House of Commons that he was struck by recent images of thousands of Palestinians walking home through the Gaza rubble. “They must be allowed home, they must be allowed to rebuild,” he told MPs. “And we should be with them in that rebuild on the way to that two-state solution.”
Australian responses
So far, Prime Minister Albanese has failed to openly condemn Trump’s Gaza proposal.
While other world leaders have explicitly rejected Trump’s proposal, Albanese has simply restated Australia’s “longstanding” support for a two-state solution. “I’m not going to, as Australia’s prime minister, give a daily commentary on statements by the US president. My job is to support Australia’s position,” he told reporters at Parliament House on Wednesday.
During an ABC radio interview on Thursday, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories, Francesca Albanese, said the Prime Minister’s response to Trump’s proposal was “pathetic”. She said that there was criticism of the Prime Minister for “not sticking to Australia’s human rights commitment when it comes to Palestine”. She described Trump’s plan as “nonsense” and “absolutely unlawful”, adding that it represented forced displacement of the Palestinian people.
With respect to the Prime Minister’s reference to a two-state solution, Francesca Albanese told ABC radio:
I think that there are many countries which have a word to say about the two-state solution, and then they do not even recognise the state of Palestine. If Australia is not ready to recognise the state of Palestine, it has nothing to say about the two-state solution, it has nothing to contribute … when it comes to the two-state solution.5
Even more disturbing was the response by Opposition leader, Peter Dutton.
Dutton, in a weekly interview on 2GB radio on Thursday, also failed to explicitly oppose Trump’s proposal. Rather he praised the US president as “shrewd” and a “big thinker and a deal maker.”
Dutton said that those who dismissed Trump’s takeover plan for Gaza defied “the reality of the gravitas that he brings to the situation”, adding that Trump was trying to force allies to contribute more to rebuilding the region.
“I don’t think they’re unreasonable expectations, but yes, I think it is about how do you leverage the best possible outcome to provide that peace and stability,” he said.6
Responding to Dutton’s comments, Australia Palestine Advocacy Network (APAN) president, Nasser Mashni, said Gaza was not a bargaining chip and no one, including Trump, had the right to dictate Palestinians’ future. He added:
Dutton is legitimising a plan to erase Palestinians from their homeland under the guise of peace. Ethnic cleansing is not ‘big thinking’, it is a crime against humanity. To support it is to support the commission of a crime.7
United action needed
The Albanese government should immediately join with other countries around the world and unequivocally reject Trump’s call for the expulsion of Palestinians from Gaza.
The government should also take meaningful action to prevent further atrocities being inflicted on the Palestinian people in the Occupied Territories, as demanded by the International Court of Justice.8
Notes
1. On 21st November 2024, the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for Netanyahu alleging responsibility for the war crime of starvation as a method of warfare and the crimes against humanity of murder, persecution, and other inhumane acts during Israel’s war on Gaza.
2. Prof. Ben Saul, ‘The legalities of Trump’s Gaza pitch’, ABC RN Breakfast interview, Feb 6, 2025. Prof. Saul is also the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms while Countering Terrorism.
3. Al Jazeera, ‘World reaction to Trump’s ‘take over’ and ethnic cleansing plan for Gaza’, News, Israel-Palestine conflict, Feb 5, 2025.
4. Defending the rights of Palestinians is laudable. But ruthlessly targeting individuals and human rights advocates for peacefully exercising their rights to freedom of expression or association, including the imposition of lengthy prison terms or death following grossly unfair trials, is inexcusable. Refer to Amnesty International, Report on human rights in Saudi Arabia, 2023 and ‘Still no justice for state-sanctioned murder of Jamal Khashoggi five years on’, Sep 29, 2023.
5. Currently, 146 of 193 UN member states recognise Palestinian statehood.
6. David Aidone, ‘Dutton says Trump brings ‘gravitas’, as Albanese’s response to Gaza plan labelled ‘pathetic’, SBS News, Feb 6, 2025.
7. Ibid. Also refer to APAN’s media release: ‘Australia must reject US-Israel calls for genocide, ethnic cleansing of Palestinians’, Feb 5, 2025.
8. International Court of Justice, ‘Legal Consequences arising from the Policies and Practices of Israel in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem: The Court gives its Advisory Opinion and responds to the questions posed by the General Assembly’, Press Release, Jul 19, 2024. Also refer to MPG’s post ‘ICJ rules Israel’s presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory unlawful‘, Jul 22, 2024.