AMMAN (AFP) – US President Donald Trump’s proposal to uproot Gazans to Egypt and Jordan is a “hostile” move against the two US allies and aims to “liquidate the Palestinian cause”, Jordanian analysts told AFP.
The US leader on Saturday floated an idea to “clean out” Gaza after more than 15 months of war between Israel and Hamas had reduced the Palestinian territory to a “demolition site”.
“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,” Trump added.
He said the displacement of Gazans to neighbouring Egypt and Jordan could be done “temporarily or could be long term”.
For Oraib Rantawi, director of the Al Quds Center for Political Studies in Amman, the idea is “a hostile position” by the new US administration towards Palestinians, Jordan and Egypt.
Jordan already hosts 2.3 million Palestinian refugees and has repeatedly rejected any project aiming to make the kingdom an “alternative homeland”.
“Our rejection of the displacement of Palestinians is firm and will not change. Jordan is for Jordanians and Palestine is for Palestinians,” Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi said on Sunday.
Rantawi said the idea was “a threat for the security and stability” of Israel’s two neighbours, seeing a “message of pressure” for Amman and a “poisoned gift” for Cairo.
Such a plan would bring closer a wider displacement of Palestinians, particularly from the occupied West Bank, to Jordan and aim to “liquidate the Palestinian cause at the expense of Arab countries”, Rantawi told AFP.
For Palestinians, any attempt to move them from Gaza would evoke dark memories of what the Arab world calls the “Nakba” or “catastrophe” – the mass displacement of Palestinians during Israel’s creation in 1948.
Trump’s proposal comes after the United States issued a broad freeze on foreign aid except that destined for Egypt and Israel.
Jordanian writer and political analyst Adel Mahmoud called Trump’s idea “unrealistic” and a reflection of “the position of the Israeli far right” made under “a humanitarian pretext”.
“Jordan and Egypt will not accept it,” he added.
Egypt has previously warned against any “forced displacement” of Palestinians from Gaza into the Sinai desert, and on Sunday rejected any infringement of Palestinians’ “inalienable rights… whether temporarily or long-term”.
“According to our experience of the 70 to 80 years of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, any temporary measure adopted by Israel ends up becoming permanent,” Rantawi said.
Saleh al-Armouti, an MP with Jordan’s main opposition Islamic Action Front party, said Trump’s proposal was a “violation of Jordan’s sovereignty” and a “declaration of war”.
King Abdullah II has set out red lines including no “judaisation of Jerusalem, no resettlement of Palestinians and no alternative homeland”, he said.
