During a press conference with PM Netanyahu on Tuesday evening, President Trump said the United States “will take over” the Gaza Strip. Around the world, observers were shocked. But the statement didn’t come out of the blue.
“The US will take over the Gaza Strip and we will do a job with it too,” Trump said during the conference. “We’ll own it and be responsible for dismantling all of the dangerous unexploded bombs and other weapons on the site, level the site and get rid of the destroyed buildings.”
Asked to elaborate on his “takeover” comment and whether he was willing to send US troops to fill a security vacuum in Gaza, Trump did not rule it out. “We’re going to take over [Gaza] we’re going to develop it.” Even though Trump willing to bury the refugee agency UNRWA, he added: “I do see a long-term ownership position, and I see it bringing great stability to that part of the Middle East, and maybe the entire Middle East.”
Trump, a real estate tycoon himself, said he had studied the matter “closely, over a lot of months.” Gaza, he suggested, could become a “Riviera of the Middle East.”
In effect, the idea goes back to his son-in-law, a secret plan of an Israeli ministry, and a long-term effort at ethnic cleansing.
Hellbound and Down 