Trump suggests his plan for Gaza Strip is to ‘clean out the whole thing’

CNN
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President Donald Trump indicated Saturday that he had spoken with the king of Jordan about a potential plan to construct housing and move more than 1 million Palestinians from the Gaza Strip to other countries, a remarkable and unusual proposal from a sitting US president.

Questioned about his earlier Saturday call with Jordan’s Abdullah II, Trump said he had asked the king to take additional Palestinians into his country.

“I said to him that I’d love you to take on more, because I’m looking at the whole Gaza Strip right now and it’s a mess, it’s a real mess,” he told reporters aboard Air Force One.

Trump said he would like both Jordan and Egypt to house people and that he would speak to Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi about the matter on Sunday.

“You’re talking about a million and a half people, and we just clean out that whole thing,” Trump said, adding that there have been centuries-long conflicts in the region.

He continued, “I don’t know, something has to happen, but it’s literally a demolition site right now. Almost everything’s demolished and people are dying there, so I’d rather get involved with some of the Arab nations and build housing in a different location where I think they could maybe live in peace for a change.”

The president said that the potential housing “could be temporary” or “could be long term.”

Trump also confirmed he had lifted a Biden-era hold on the provision of 2,000-pound bombs for Israel.

“We released them today and they’ll have them. They paid for them and they’ve been waiting for them for a long time,” he told reporters.

CNN previously reported the Trump administration had lifted the hold.