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Trump says ‘nobody’s expelling any Palestinians,’ in apparent softening of Gaza plan
In an apparent softening of his proposal to take over the Gaza Strip, US President Donald Trump asserted Wednesday that the plan does not involve expelling Palestinians.
During a press spray with Ireland’s Prime Minister Michael Martin in the Oval Office, a reporter asked the Irish leader about Trump’s plan to “to expel Palestinians out of Gaza.”
“Nobody’s expelling any Palestinians,” Trump piped in.
When pressed as to whether this would be done by force, Trump insisted that no Gazans actually want to remain in the war-torn Strip.
Trump’s refusal for the past month to clarify that the relocation of Gazans would be voluntary placed him to the right of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his hardline allies, who have insisted that Palestinians would not be forced to leave and that those interested in doing so would be supported.
Hamas spokesperson Hazem Qassem welcomed what he viewed as a retreat by Trump from his stance on relocating Gazans, urging him to refrain from aligning with the vision of the “extreme Zionist right.”
While Trump has stood by his plan more broadly, the work to implement it has been limited and several of his top advisers have insisted that the goal was largely to push Arab allies of the United States to come up with their own proposal for the post-war management of Gaza.
Egypt introduced its plan last week, which was endorsed by the Arab League during a summit in Cairo.
The proposal provides for international peacekeeping troops to be deployed in Gaza through a UN Security Council resolution. In the meantime, Egypt and Jordan would train Palestinian Authority police officers, so that they can then be dispatched to uphold law and order in Gaza.
The plan divides Gaza into seven different zones and envisions each being rebuilt consecutively in a manner that allows all Palestinians to remain in the Strip during the process. This crosses with comments from Trump and other US officials who insist that Gaza won’t be safe for Palestinians during the 10 to 15 years that it is being rebuilt.
The plan does not address Hamas by name, instead maintaining that the issue and fate of armed groups in Gaza can only be fully addressed through a political process that establishes a Palestinian state.
Still, the Arab League, in a statement endorsing the Egyptian plan, asserted that the security of Gaza “remains an exclusive responsibility of legitimate Palestinian institutions, in accordance with the principle of one law and one legitimate weapon” — indicating that the presence of armed groups other than the Palestinian Authority’s security forces would not be accepted.
The lack of explicit mention of Hamas and disarmament frustrated the Trump administration, which views the terror group’s removal from power as essential to ensuring that Gaza can be rebuilt and avoid returning to the cycle of war that has plagued the enclave for years.
Washington’s Arab partners oppose Hamas to varying degrees but have preferred to take a less public approach to phasing the terrorist organization out of Gaza, while arguing that disarming Hamas will not be possible absent a broader political initiative to establish a Palestinian state.
Last week, US special envoy to the Middle East Steve Witkoff called the Egyptian plan a “good faith first step” with “a lot of compelling features to it.” The remarks were more welcoming than ones made by spokespeople for the State Department and White House National Security Council, who characterized the Arab plan as “inadequate.”
Witkoff met on Wednesday in Doha with the foreign ministers of Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Egypt and Jordan to discuss the Arab plan.
The group agreed to continue consultations with Witkoff regarding Egypt’s plan they said in a joint statement issued after their meeting.
Notably joining the foreign ministers was Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas’s top aide Hussein al-Sheikh, who last met with Witkoff in January in Riyadh.
‘A Palestinian as far as I’m concerned’
During Wednesday’s Oval Office spray, Trump also lamented that people are forgetting what Hamas did on October 7. He reiterated the brutal treatment of the hostages by the terror group.
“We’re working hard with Israel… to see [how] we can solve the problem,” Trump said.
He again called Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer a “Palestinian,” using the term as an insult.
Generally, Trump has opted for such language to disparage Democrats whom he sees as inadequately supportive of Israel.
In this case, by contrast, Trump made the comments while talking about corporate tax rates. After saying that the American public will blame Democrats for high taxes, Trump launched into an aside on the New York senator, his top adversary in Congress who on Wednesday was opposing a Republican-drafted funding bill. (The setting was ironic for the comments as the Irish government is staunchly pro-Palestinian.)
“And Schumer is a Palestinian as far as I’m concerned,” Trump said. “You know, he’s become a Palestinian. He used to be Jewish. He’s not Jewish anymore. He’s a Palestinian.”
Schumer, the New York Democrat and Senate minority leader, has spoken frequently about his Jewish identity throughout his political career. He is soon to release a book about fighting antisemitism.
A spokesperson for Schumer did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Both Trump’s supporters and opponents shared clips of the remark online, and it has drawn criticism from some liberal Jewish organizations.
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