Trump doubles down on plan to empty Gaza. This is what he has said and what's at stake

[February 12, 2025]  By LEE KEATH

CAIRO (AP) — Behind U.S. President Donald Trump’s vows to turn Gaza into a “Riviera of the Middle East” lies a plan to forcibly drive a population from its land, rights groups say, warning it could be a war crime under international law.

Trump doubled down this week on his vows to empty Gaza permanently of its more than 2 million Palestinians, saying they would not be allowed to return and suggesting at one point he might force Egypt and Jordan to take them in by threatening to cut off U.S. aid.

Whether it’s serious, a negotiating tactic or a distraction, Palestinians have roundly rejected the idea of leaving. Some say Trump’s talk normalizes their erasure and dehumanization, amplifying the idea that they have no connection to their land or right to their homes.

“He is talking as if the Palestinians are cattle, you can move them from one place to another. They have no agency, they have no say,” said Munir Nuseibah, a professor of international law at Jerusalem’s Al-Quds University.

The plan
Trump has billed the plan as being for the Palestinians’ own benefit after Israel’s 16-month campaign demolished entire neighborhoods and left much of Gaza unlivable. In its place, Trump has promised them a “beautiful new land” elsewhere.

The United States would then take over the territory and rebuild it as a “Riviera” for the “world’s people.”

Palestinians have made clear they don’t want to leave Gaza, one part of their homeland that remains for them, along with pockets of the West Bank, after the Mideast’s 1948 and 1967 wars. Despite Gaza's devastation, Palestinians have shown a determination to stay and rebuild with international help promised in the U.S.-brokered ceasefire with Israel.

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict in many ways is rooted in the 1948 war surrounding Israel's creation — during which hundreds of thousands of Palestinians were expelled from or forced to flee their homes in what is now Israel — and the 1967 war, when Israel captured the West Bank, east Jerusalem and Gaza. Palestinians want those territories for a future state.

The ambiguity
Trump has left it ambiguous how Palestinians would be removed or what would happen if they refused to go.

Asked by reporters at the White House on Monday if the U.S. would force Palestinians out, Trump replied: “You’re going to see that they’re all going to want to leave.”

At one point, he said a rebuilt Gaza would be a place for anyone — possibly including Palestinians — to live, and administration officials have said Palestinians' removal would be temporary.

But Trump contradicted that in an interview with Fox News Channel that aired Monday. Asked whether Palestinians would have the right to return to Gaza, he replied: “No, they wouldn’t because they’re going to have much better housing. In other words, I’m talking about building a permanent place for them.”

In a post Thursday on his Truth Social site, Trump said Israel would turn over Gaza to the U.S. “at the conclusion of fighting.” By that time, he wrote, all the Palestinians “would have already been resettled in far safer and more beautiful communities.”

Resettled how? Trump hasn't said.

Fighting in Gaza has been paused a ceasefire. There are fears Israel could renew its campaign to destroy Hamas if the two sides can’t reach an agreement over a second phase of the deal, including the big question of how Gaza will be governed.

The ceasefire is already precarious after Hamas accused Israel of violating the truce and said it would pause releases of hostages. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu then threatened to withdraw from the deal if the militant group does not release more hostages on Saturday.

Forced displacement?
With Palestinians refusing to go, Trump’s ambiguity raises fears they would be forced to.

Calls for a mass transfer of Palestinians were once relegated to the fringes of political discourse in Israel.

But the idea has gained traction in the mainstream — the result of frustration from years of failed peace efforts, recurring rounds of violence, and the painful images of the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack that triggered the current war. Israeli leaders have talked of “voluntary” migration.

A man walks between tents for displaced Palestinians next to destroyed buildings following the Israeli air and ground offensive in Jabaliya, Gaza Strip, Thursday, Feb. 6, 2025. (AP Photo/Abdel Kareem Hana, file)

The Geneva Conventions forbid “mass forcible transfers” from occupied lands “regardless of their motive.” The International Criminal Court — where the U.S and Israel are not members — also holds that “forcible transfer” can be a war crime or, in some circumstances, a crime against humanity.

Forcible transfer was among the crimes that Nazi leaders were charged with in the Nuremberg trials after World War II. It was also among the acts for which some Bosnian Serb leaders were convicted by a U.N. tribunal over atrocities during the 1990s Balkan wars.

Adam Coogle, deputy director of Human Rights Watch’s Middle East & North Africa Division, said he didn’t know if Trump’s statements would turn into policy, “but the statement of intent is very concerning.”

“The moving out of the entire Palestinian population, any movement of a people in occupied territory out of that territory, is forced displacement,” he said. If done with intent, he said, it could be a war crime.

Amnesty International echoed that, saying forcibly expelling Palestinians is a war crime and could be a crime against humanity.

Nuseibah pointed to rulings by the U.N. court for the former Yugoslavia and other international bodies saying that “any type of pressure or duress” to leave constitutes forcible transfer.

“It doesn’t have to be at gunpoint,” he said.

Asked by a reporter Tuesday about criticism that moving Palestinians out of Gaza could be “ethnic cleansing,” Trump did not directly answer, repeating that they would go to “a beautiful location, where they will have new homes and can live safely.”

The White House pointed to those comments when asked specifically about the potential that the permanent relocation of Palestinians is a war crime.

The response
Many Palestinians have been staggered that Trump takes it on himself to speak on their behalf.

“Why don’t they just ask us what we want?” said Nuseibah. “It is dehumanizing.”

Raji Sourani, a leading rights lawyer from Gaza, said Trump’s stance was “Kafkaesque.”

“This is the first time ever in history that the president of the United States speaks publicly and frankly to commit one of the most serious crimes,” said Sourani, who left Gaza for Egypt after Israeli airstrikes destroyed his home in the early days of the war.

Sourani accused Trump of aiming to “complete the genocide” he said was begun by Israel.

The International Court of Justice is considering arguments that Israel’s campaign in Gaza constitutes genocide. Israel denies the accusation, saying it is acting in self-defense to destroy Hamas.

As proof of their commitment to stay, Palestinians point to the flood of hundreds of thousands of people returning to homes in Gaza under the ceasefire — even to ones that were destroyed.

On Monday, Hatem Mohammed set up a tarp to shelter his family from a cold rain on the ruins of their destroyed home. Their home lies in the so-called Netzarim corridor, a strip of land where troops leveled large areas to create a closed military zone during the war, before their withdrawal over the weekend.

“This is our land, this is our identity and that of our fathers and grandfathers,” Mohammed said. “Trump wants to deny our identity. No, our identity remains.”

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Associated Press journalists Omar Akour in Amman, Jordan, and Mohammed Jahjouh in Mughraqa, Gaza Strip, contributed.

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