Donald Trump’s recent endorsement of the ethnic cleansing of Gaza for the benefit of Israel is about as blatant as it could be. The suggestion, however, does not come from a worked-out strategy, even though the Trump cabinet and the US president himself are ardent supporters of the Zionist project. It is more likely an indication of the utter impasse in which his administration finds itself, and so, without any clear policy about how to process over Gaza, Trump is blindly searching about for ideas.
Speaking to reporters about Gaza, aboard his official plane, AirForce One, he told reporters, “I’d like Egypt to take people. And I’d like Jordan to take people.” He then added, “You’re talking about a million and half people, and we just clean out that whole thing.” Leaving aside the fact that he underestimated the Gaza Palestinian population by about a third, “clean out” means ethnic cleansing, no more, no less. It is music to the ears of the Zionist establishment and far right-ministers in Israel, most of whom have rushed to support Trump’s comments.
The leaders of Arab states immediately expressed their disagreement with Trump’s suggestion, notably those states who would be expected to receive the Palestinians “cleaned out”, Egypt and Jordan.
Its foreign ministry said Egypt rejected any attempt to undermine Palestinians’ “inalienable rights . . . by annexation of land or by emptying this land of its owners through displacement or encouraging the transfer or uprooting of Palestinians from their land whether that was temporary or long term”. On Tuesday, the front page of Egypt’s state-owned Al-Ahram daily, which reflects government policy, featured a large picture of Palestinians streaming back to north Gaza. The headline read: “Egypt [speaks] as one man: The people reject displacement and support efforts to protect national security as the Palestinians write their ‘epic of return’.”
Egypt and Jordan opposed to Trump’s ethnic cleansing
Jordan’s foreign minister is in public of the same view. He commented to Reuters that the kingdom’s rejection of displacement of the Palestinians was “firm and unwavering”. (Financial Times, January 26). “The solution to the Palestinian issue”, he said, “lies in Palestine”. Ignoring the fact that so much of the Jordanian population are Palestinian, he added, “Jordan is for Jordanians and Palestine is for Palestinians.”
The reasons for these states rejection of displacement are clear. A senior fellow at the Washington Center for American Progress told the Financial Times that such a transfer “could be deeply destabilising particularly for Jordan [which already has a large Palestinian population] and potentially for Egypt to relocate Palestinians to the Sinai for example, because it could mean conflict between Palestinian militants and Israel”.
Saudi Arabia, one of the key allies of the USA in the Middle East, has repeated its opposition to any other solution to the Palestinian question other than a separate Palestinian state. This view was repeated days after Trump’s remarks by the Saudi ambassador to the UK.
There is no doubting Trump’s support for Israel. His cabinet is packed with supporters of Zionism and he has promised Israel “unwavering support”. He newsly appointed ambassador to the UN even said in her confirmation hearing in Congress that she thought Israel had a “biblical right” to the West Bank.
Jordan and Egypt are recipients of US foreign aid
Both Jordan and Egypt are recipients of US foreign aid. Egypt is, the second biggest recipient of all, although a long way behind the biggest, Israel. Marco Rubio, Trump’s new Secretary of State recently announced a halt to all work on US foreign aid, but there were two exceptions made, being Israel (of course) and Egypt. If Trump is unable – as seems likely – to persuade these governments to agree his ethnic cleansing plan, then he will almost certainly threaten to bring US financial muscle to bear: by threatening to withhold aid, or offering additional funds, or both.
The director of the US programme, the International Crisis Group, told the Financial Times that “while it was not clear how far Trump would go, one pressure point on Egypt would be the $1.3bn of annual military assistance received by Cairo to buy US weapons and spare parts for US materiel purchased in previous years”. These financial benefits, he said, have been been “the backbone of ties”. They were started with Egypt began to ‘normalise’ relations with Israel in 1978, and since then have amounted to more than $50bn.
The USA could put similar pressure on Jordan. Since relations were established in 1949, the USA has provided $31bn of aid. The USA and Jordan recently signed a ‘memorandum of understanding’ under which Washington would provide another $1.45bn a year until 2029.
It is a reasonable question to ask, therefore, if it is possible for the leaders of these two Arab states to be ‘bought off’ in this way and to accommodate the joint Trump/Netanyahu plan for the ethnic cleansing of Gaza. After all, the ‘support’ for the Palestinian people by the leaders of these states is largely for public consumption, to mollify the anger of their own populations over Israel’s treatment of fellow Arabs.
Egyptian and Jordanian leaders have no real loyalty to Palestine
When Gaza was governed by Egypt between 1948 and 1967, there was not the slightest attempt by Egypt to develop the area economically – it was kept as an open, festering sore for twenty years, with limited movement into Egypt for the population. Jordan, too, has in the past brutally suppressed the Palestinain movement, such as in ‘Black September’ (1970), when thousands of PLO fighters were killed and the PLO driven out, to Lebanon.
However, although noting in politics is certain, it seems unlikely that even financial pressure will move the Egyptian and Jordanian governments.
Picture – thousands going back to Gaza
As a Financial Times journalist was told by a diplomat in the region, “Given where Jordan’s economy is at the moment, any move could have a bigger impact than you might think,” Jordan is already home to millions of Palestinians, and its economy has been put under huge stress by support for hundreds of thousands of refugees from the civil war in Syria.Carrying through Trump’s “cleaning” plan would “really threaten security dynamics in both countries, and the political legitimacy of the leaders”. (Our emphasis)
Donald Trump is facing a profound contradiction, as is the political leadership in Israel. They would dearly love to carry out the ethnic cleansing of Gaza – followed at a later stage by the same in the West Bank. But they are in a bind, because the biggest single obstacle to the project of Zionism is the continued existence and the resilience of the Palestinian population. Trump and Netanyahu must be aware at some level that a return to the bombing in Gaza, where a minimum of 47,000 have already been killed would provoke a storm of protest around the world, even eclipsing the movements that have already taken place.
Half the population ruled by Israel are not Jewish
Supporters of Israel in Britain, such as those in the so-called ‘Jewish Labour Movement’, mimic Benjamin Netanyahu in referring to Israel as the “Jewish state”. But in fact, half of the population governed by Israel are Arabs, mostly Muslim, most of them without any political or democratic freedoms and subject to military brutality and assault. It is not a sustainable situation, any more than was apartheid in South Africa.
The coming months and years will see political earthquakes in the Middle East, including in Israel. But short term developments are almost impossible to foresee. The next five weeks will be tense, especially for Palestinians, who must fear the nightmare scenario of a resumption of bombing.
The big questions are these: to what extent will Israel be prepared to negotiate with Hamas, even through mediators in Qatar. It is clear from recent pictures that Hamas is far from “destroyed”, which was a key war aim for Netanyahu.
Netanyahu is a politician with a track record of lying and further “negotiations” are not likely to be sincere on his part. But extending the ceasefire in any form risks him losing his majority by desertions from the far right. Moreover, the longer the ceasefire holds and the more hostages are exchanged, the higher will be the political and diplomatic price that Israel would pay if the killing of Gazans was to resume.
Israel is already a pariah state among hundreds of millions across the globe. Is it possible for Israel’s world standing to sink any lower? We will see in just over a month’s time.
US selling Israel more 2,000lb bombs
In his throw-away comments on AirForce One Trump added that Gaza “is literally a demolition site right now, almost everything is demolished and people are dying there.” He didn’t add, of course, that it was US weaponry in Israeli hands that had wreaked such terrible devastation on Gaza or that the had given the OK to a new shipment of 2,000lb bombs to Israel – munitions that have a devastating impact of buildings and anyone near them.
Meanwhile, the determination of Palestinians to remain in Gaza and the West Bank, seems unbroken, despite the daily killings and repression meted out by the IDF. They will not participate voluntarily in a new Nakba.
This report in an article in Al Jazeera is testimony to a nation’s resolve and determination, as thousands of Gazans return to the northern parts of the region, even putting up tents where their houses once stood and there remains nothing but rubble.
“The resilience of the Palestinian people is both inspiring and heartbreaking. Inspiring because they continue to survive, to rebuild, to dream of a better future despite the odds. Heartbreaking because no one should have to be this resilient. No one should have to endure this level of suffering just to exist”.
Trump will soon come to appreciate that there is more to the issue of Gaza than his craven support for the ultra-Zionists in his administration and Netanyahu’s cabinet.
[Pictures of Palestinians returning to northern Gaza from Al Jazeera newsfeed. Trump and Netanyahu picture from Wikimedia Commons, here.]
