It is undoubtedly the declaration of too much. Too difficult to assume for administration. After a deluge of international criticisms on the Donald Trump project for American control of Gaza to make it the “Côte d’Azur du Middle East” and move its population, the White House wanted to rectify the comments of the president , bringing nuance, even contradiction.
24 hours after the shattering declaration of the American leader on Tuesday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that any transfer from the Gazaouis would be temporary. Donald Trump wants to “rebuild buildings” so that “people can go back,” he said. The White House said that Donald Trump had not committed “for the moment” to send troops to Gaza.
“A reconstruction offer”
Tuesday, at a joint press conference with Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu, Donald Trump had repeated that, according to him, residents of the Gaza Strip, in ruins after 15 months of war, could go to live in Jordan or in Egypt. “The United States will take control of the Gaza Strip and we are going to do a good job with it,” he said, speaking of the Palestinian territory as a “demolition site”. “We will take possession of it and be responsible for the dismantling of all the dangerous bombs that have not exploded and all weapons,” he added, stressing that the United States would “flatten the area and get rid of Buildings destroyed “, in order to economically develop the Palestinian territory and make Gaza the” Côte d’Azur du Middle East “.
A few hours later, Donald Trump assured that “everyone ador[ait]”His proposal, despite the multiple indignant reactions.” What President Trump announced yesterday is the offer, the will of the United States to take charge of the reconstruction of this area, “tried to defuse the chief of American diplomacy Marco Rubio, even evoking a “very generous gesture”, as reported by the agency AP.
In the same time, the spokesperson for the White House, Karoline Leavitt said on Wednesday that the United States “will not finance the reconstruction of Gaza”. The American administration will work with its “partners in the region to rebuild” Gaza, she added. “The United States must get involved in this reconstruction effort,” she said. But “that does not mean that there will be (American) troops on the ground in Gaza, or that the American taxpayers will finance this effort”.
“Throwing oil on the fire”
Donald Trump’s words intervened a few hours before the delicate negotiations on the pursuit of the truce in Gaza. Hamas accused him of “throwing oil on the fire”. In an interview with the Fox News channel on Wednesday evening, Israeli leader Benyamin Netanyahu described the idea of ”remarkable”. “This is the first good idea that I heard,” he said, saying that it should be “examined, prosecuted and achieved”. Benyamin Netanyahu suggested that the initiative did not necessarily mean that the Palestinians permanently leave the territory. The American proposal, on the other hand, has hit the end of the Palestinian administration. “We will not allow the rights of our people to be flouted,” said Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, Rival of Hamas.
As a whole, the international community castigated Donald Trump’s words. The Egyptian president and his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron warned that any “forced displacement of the Palestinian population in Gaza as in the West Bank would be unacceptable”. Jordan, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and the Arab League also rejected the American plan, as well as the European Union. And the UN secretary general, Antonio Guterres, warned against an “ethnic cleaning” in the Palestinian territory.