Inside Trump’s quickly written suggestions to ‘own’ gaza

When President Trump announced his proposal that the United States should take ownership of Gaza on Tuesday, he even shocked senior members in his own White House and the government.

While his message saw formal and well thought out, he read the plan from a sheet of paper-had his administration did not even have the most basic planning to explore the possibility of the idea, according to four people with knowledge of the discussions, which was not authorized to speak in public.

It wasn’t just the Americans shrinking; The message came just as much of a surprise to Mr. Trump’s Israeli visitors. Shortly before embarking on their joint news conference on Tuesday, Trump Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu from Israel surprised by telling him that he was planning to advertise the Gaza ownership page, according to two people informed of their interactions.

Inside the US government, there had been no meetings with the state department or pentagon, which would normally occur for any serious foreign policy proposal, so much less one of such size. There had been no working groups. The Department of Defense had not produced any estimates of the required troop numbers or cost estimates or even an overview of how it can work.

There was little beyond an idea inside the president’s head.

Unlike major foreign policy messages with former presidents, including Mr. Trump, the notion that the United States had controlled Gaza never been part of a public discussion before Tuesday.

But in private Mr. Trump talked about American ownership of the enclave for weeks. And his thinking was, according to two administrative officials, accelerated after his Middle East -emerging, Steve Witkoff, returned from Gaza last week and described the terrible conditions there.

But no one – not in the White House, not the Israelis – expected Trump to roll out the idea on Tuesday until shortly before he did. The idea was met with immediate resistance from the Arab world, including from Saudi Arabia, an important American ally. And in comments on journalists on Wednesday, the White House tried press secretary Karoline Leavitt to soften some of Mr. Trump’s statements.

While Mr. Trump had questioned why Palestinians would return to Gaza after moving and suggesting that the area could become a refuge for tourists, Mrs. Leavitt maintained that Mr. Trump simply wanted Jordan and Egypt to take Palestinians “temporarily.” And she minimized the idea of ​​US economic investment, despite Mr. Trump makes up a “long -term ownership” interest.

She also said that the president had not committed to putting boots on the ground, even though Mr. Trump had said, “We will do what is needed. And if necessary we do. “

It is unclear if Mr. Trump previously discussed the matter in detail with the Israelis. A spokeswoman for the Israeli Embassy did not respond to a message sought clarity.

His presentation left more questions than answers such as: How would this work? How many US troops would be required to clear Hamas and mountains of rubble and mitigate all the unexploded ordnance? What would it cost to rebuild a demolition site the size of Las Vegas? How would the seizure of Palestinian territory be eligible under international law? And what would happen to two million refugees?

In the hours following the announcement, senior administrative officials were especially short on material answers. The reason for their evasivity soon became clear: No actual details existed.

On Wednesday, Mr. Trump’s national security adviser Mike Waltz, on “CBS Morning” to sell the Gaza idea. But the conversation showed that this was less a plan than “concepts of a plan”, such as Mr. Trump described his ideas for health policy during the 2024 campaign. This plan was never realized.

“The fact that no one has a realistic solution, and he puts some very bold, fresh new ideas out on the table, I don’t think to be criticized in any way,” said Mr. Waltz. “I think it will bring the whole region to come up with their own solutions if they don’t like Mr. Trump’s solution. “

Mr. Trump has publicly pressed the Jordanians and Egyptians in public for weeks to take on people from Gaza, but so far both the countries’ leaders have refused. Removal of Gaza -Palestinians would violate international law, but Mr. Trump said at his news conference on Tuesday that he expected them to be eager to leave the country because it was uninhabitable. Maybe they could return in the end, he said.

He said all this as he stood next to Mr. Netanyahu, whose military campaign had wiped out much of Gaza after the Hamas terror attacks in Israel on October 7, 2023 – which created the conditions that Mr. Trump referred to.

“The US takes over the Gaza Strip, and we will also do a job with it,” Mr. Trump. “We will own it and be responsible for dismantling all the dangerous unexploded bombs and other weapons on site. Level the place and get rid of the broken buildings. Level it out. “

Mr. Netanyahu, who has been trying to clear Hamas from Gaza since October 7th massacre of more than 1,200 people, looked happy, like Mr. Trump spoke.

Other US officials were less enthusiastic about the proposal. Two people close to Mr. Trump insisted that it was his idea alone; One said they had never heard him mention the involvement of American troops before Tuesday.

Several senior officials who spoke on condition of anonymity to describe sensitive discussions, the New York Times told them they were still trying to find out the idea of ​​the idea and considered it fantastic even for Mr. Trump.

The concept is difficult to squeeze with Mr. Trump’s criticism of former presidents of nation-building in the Middle East. His suggestion that America takes responsibility for one of the world’s worst disaster zones also came when he closed the primary federal government agency responsible for foreign development assistance, USAID

But Mr. Trump’s impulses have never been as anti-interventionist as the isolationists of his party who want them. When the Iraq war began, he initially cheered it before condemning it. In 2011, when he was considering driving as president, he said the United States should “take the oil” from Iraq, and he has promoted the idea that the US military extraction of critical minerals from overseas war zones.

In his second presidential term, he has put his imperialist impulses on screen. He has said he wants the United States to buy Greenland and refuses to exclude military strength despite the existence of an American base there. He has said that he will take back the Panama Canal and that Canada should become the 51 of America. He has said he believes that the United States should be entitled to Ukraine’s natural resources as a refund for all the military assistance that America has sent to help the Ukrainians defend themselves against the Russians.

Mr. Trump considers foreign policy a producer of real estate. He has never been interested in international law, never presented autocratic leaders of human rights, as other US presidents have done.

Instead of for decades, he has seen the world as a collection of countries ripping America off. He is concerned with the question of how to get gearing over other nations, whether allies or opponents. And he searches for ways to use American power to dominate other countries and extract what he can. Mr. Trump does not believe in “win-win” diplomacy; All offers, whether in business or foreign affairs, have a clear winner and a clear loser.

Like Mr. Trump is his Middle East -Release, Mr. Witkoff, a real estate developer and investor who has done business in the region. And Mr. Trump’s son -in -law Jared Kushner, another real estate investor who worked the Middle East portfolio in his first period, Riffed Last year about the incredible development opportunities presented by Gaza Waterfront.

More advisers for Mr. Trump said they expected the Gaza ownership page to die away quietly as it became clear to Mr. Trump that it was impossible. And it already seemed to happen before Wednesday afternoon.

But Daniel B. Shapiro, who served as US ambassador to Israel under President Barack Obama, and recently in the Pentagon, said even just floating the idea risked provoking more extremism: “This is not a serious proposal. The United States, who takes over Gaza, for massive costs in dollars and troops, is about as likely as Mexico pays for the Wall or the United States grabbing Iraq’s oil. “

“The danger is that extremists in the Israeli government and terrorists in various stripes will take it literally and seriously and start acting on it,” he said. “It can imperilate the further release of hostages, set a goal on the back of the US staff, and undercut the prospect of a Saudi-Israeli normalization agreement.”

When the Trump team hears warnings like this from former Democratic Administrative Officials, they cater to Obama Mednes (though Mr. Shapiro was not among them) Wrong warned that the Middle East would fall into violence after Trump moved the US Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem in 2017. They also point out that it was Mr. Trump, who delivered normalization agreements between Israel and four Muslim majority states in his first period-one effort, known as Abraham agreements that the Biden administration tried unsuccessfully to expand.

Mr. Trump’s Gaza acquisition idea was delighted by many on the hard right of Israel and some in America’s pro-Israeli community. The Israeli government has long wanted to take back Gaza from the Palestinians to ensure that the land cannot be used to launch terrorist attacks against Israel.

David Friedman, who served as Mr. Trump’s ambassador to Israel in his first period was surprised by the message, but called the president’s idea “brilliant and out of the box creative and frankly the only solution I’ve heard in 50 years that has the chance to actually change the dynamics of the troubled part of the world.

Mr. Friedman said in an interview that the challenge his team had been exposed to in the first Trump period was that “We could never answer the basic question that is, there is someone who can rule over Gaza that does not will be a threat to the people of Gaza as well as to Israel? “

He said it was intolerable for Hamas or the Palestinians who supported it to remain in Gaza. When asked who would live there instead, Mr. Friedman that after 15 years of reconstruction it would be a “market -driven process.”

“I know I sound like a property guy,” he said, but he couldn’t help but imagine the opportunities presented by “25 miles of sunset facing beach front.”