President Donald Trump went further with his plans for Gaza on Tuesday when he said that Palestinians should be ‘permanently’ resettled elsewhere.
Trump made the explosive comments as he sat alongside a beaming Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the Oval Office of the White House.
‘I don’t think people should be going back,’ Trump said. “You can’t live in Gaza right now. I think we need another location.
‘I think it should be a location that’s going to make people happy.’
The comments will infuriate Palestinians who have long feared that Israel was seeking to take their lands.
They have lived under an economic blockade and more than a year of military bombardment, leaving the territory resembling a ‘demolition zone,’ as Trump put it.
Netanyahu is visiting to plan for the next stage of talks with Hamas, which envisages allowing three to five years for reconstruction.
American officials have already made clear that they see that timeline as unviable.
