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The betrayal of the Palestinian people has taken an even uglier turn under the Trump administration. Within days of the Israel and Hamas cease-fire, President Donald Trump proposed that the Gaza Strip be “cleaned out,” with Gaza’s 2 million people relocated to Egypt’s Sinai Desert or across the Jordanian border.
Trump’s description of Gaza today as a “demolition site” is accurate. After 15 months of relentless bombing and massacres, the United Nations reports more than 90 percent of Gazan homes have been destroyed and critical infrastructure of hospitals, schools and energy plants laid to waste.
But what Trump failed to acknowledge is that it is U.S. policy, through limitless funding of Israel’s war machine, that is partially responsible for the destruction. While Trump and Israeli settlers dream of seaside condominiums and access to Gaza’s offshore oil, all the shattered people of Gaza want to do is return to rebuild their homes, as little 5-year old Hind Rajab expressed moments before she was killed by a flurry of IDF bullets last year.
In a sharp rebuke to Trump, the leaders of Egypt and Jordan rejected Trump’s proposal, and the Arab League denounced any forced displacement of Palestinians.
From the imprisoning wall that surrounds Gaza, the Palestinian refugees who inhabit that small territory peek to glimpse the olive groves and farms that used to belong to their families before they were simply taken away from them. Trump’s plan is just the latest chapter in the systematic ethnic cleansing of the indigenous Palestinians from their homes and land.
Diana Merenda
Surry
