Donald Trump’s proposed peace plan, which includes the relocation of Palestinians from Gaza to neighboring Arab nations, appears to be part of a larger geopolitical maneuver rather than a genuine effort to establish long-term peace.
It should come as no surprise to anyone that Donald Trump has proposed relocating Palestinians from the Gaza Strip to Jordan, Egypt, and other Arab nations to “just clean out” the war-torn area … and the potential housing “could be temporary” or “could be long-term.”
The much-touted ceasefire that went into effect on 19th January 2025 was portrayed as an example of Trump’s personal power, and a “pre-inauguration” success by his supporters, and a milestone in Middle East peace. Buy nobody should have any illusions that the fighting that has raged for over a year has finally been stopped, and even if for now, the question remains but for how long?
Spoken as a True Land Developer!
Not even Trump himself is confident of the ceasefire holding, when interviewed by CNN, and he confirms that it is not our war but their war, describing Gaza as a massive demolition site and how it has to be “rebuilt-in-a-different-way” and how Gaza has a phenomenal location by the sea, with the best weather, and some beautiful things could be done with it….
The deal itself is complex, with the first stage lasting for 42 days, during which 33 Israelis held prisoner by the Palestinian resistance group in Gaza are being exchanged for 1,900 Palestinians held prisoner by Israel, often without change and in inhuman conditions.
In addition, relief convoys will now enter the devastated Gaza Strip to deliver aid, while Israel will withdraw its troops from most of Gaza, at least temporarily, but retain control of the borders. Stage two will see the negotiation of a permanent ceasefire and exchange of bodies with a “complete withdrawal” of IDF forces from Gaza, while the third and final stage will supposedly see rebuilding of the shattered territory.
Needless to say, both sides are claiming victory. Israel at the handing over of hostages by Hamas, and with public statements that Hamas has been “severely weakened”, while Hamas claims victory by having inflicted losses on Israel and survived such an intensive campaign by the IDF relatively intact. In fact, the scenes of large numbers of Hamas and other militants parading with weapons in Gaza after 16 months of fighting against the full might of the IDF, has sent a chill through the Israeli public.
Israel Frey, an independent Israeli journalist, told Middle East Eye that
“There is shock among the Israeli public“, following the images of Hamas in Gaza City.
“After a year and four months, in which the public’s eyes have been flooded with information and baseless narratives of stories of total victory and revenge, the Israeli public sees from Gaza images of Toyotas, armed Hamas members and Gaza rising from the ruins,” he said.
Netanyahu has, needless to say, come under fire from the more extreme part of the government coalition, with Israel’s far-right national security minister resigning from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Cabinet on Sunday to express his disapproval of the Gaza ceasefire deal.
The resignation does not affect the ceasefire, but does undermine Netanyahu’s government, reducing his margin of control yet further. Palestinians are beginning to return to Northern Gaza. However, there is not much to return to and how long they will be able to remain is an open question.
Also, Israel is not making their return smooth or without fear that their return will be permanent or safe. It is also afraid to face the likelihood that October 7th was allowed to happened, as the guise for what has happened to date.
So, a weakened hold on power, Trump insisting on a cessation of fighting in Gaza (and Lebanon), are we set for “peace in our time”?
Hardly, Wishful Thinking!
Firstly, Trump has cancelled funding for UNRWA, and, more ominously, removed sanctions on Settlers in the West Bank who have been attacking Palestinians with ever greater frequency and ruthlessness. He has also promised to institute sanctions against members of the International Criminal Court who have called for the arrest and trial of Netanyahu on war crimes charges.
Furthermore, the day after Trump’s inauguration, Israel launched “Operation Iron Wall” which began with massive raids in the West Bank city of Jenin. Troops, supported by armored vehicles, helicopter gunships, and airstrikes, killed at least ten and injured dozens more, in what Netanyahu describes as “actions against the Iranian axis”
Israeli NGO B’Tselem has accused the Israeli government of using the Gaza ceasefire as “an excuse and opportunity to ratchet up the oppression of West Bank Palestinians. This is not what a ceasefire looks like,” it said.
Needless to say, it is not a surprise that Israel has decided to go into the west bank, and Trump’s overt “OK” to settler violence does not bode well at all for the upcoming period. Israel is still firmly set on its expansion, as shown by the Israeli seizure of territory in Syria after the collapse of the Assad regime, and the ongoing building of bases in the areas seized in the Golan Heights past the 1974 ceasefire line.
The words used by Netanyahu, “against the Iranian axis” also raise fears of a strike on Iranian nuclear facilities, with the execrable Lindsey Graham saying clearly:
“The next topic I will be engaging in with President Trump, is to take this moment in time to decimate the Iran’s nuclear program, I don’t think diplomacy works. [President Biden’s Mideast negotiator Brett McGurk] will tell you what they have done to Hezbollah and Hamas has been amazing. The proxies [are] incredibly weakened. Israel can go anywhere they wanna go. This is a … religious Nazi regime,” he added.
“They want to destroy the Jewish state,” the South Carolina Republican continued.
“They wanna purify Islam and drive us out of the Mideast. It’d be like negotiating with Hitler. I am hoping there will be an effort by Israel to decimate the Iran nuclear program supported by the United States, and if we don’t do that, it’ll be a historical mistake.”
One wonders if Lindsey Graham actually thinks about what he says, as the regime that looks like a “religious Nazi regime” is that of Netanyahu, rather than Iran, and the idea that Hamas and Hezbollah have been weakened to the point that Graham thinks it will, has been widely discarded by anyone with half a brain.
It is obvious, that despite the immense destruction of property and civilian lives meted out by Israel, that Hamas has not been significantly weakened, let alone destroyed, as Netanyahu had promised. Rather, the hundreds of thousands of casualties, most civilians, and the devastation of not only homes, but entire communities and cities, will only result in a recruiting bonanza for Hamas, while support for Israel in the wider world has plummeted and backfired.
I suspect the desire for a ceasefire on the part of the US and Israel is, in fact, to allow Israel to switch targets to the West Bank, and, in what would be a blunder of epic proportions, to allow them to focus on Iran. Now Israel, Turkey and the US are drunk with the first impression of “victory” of overthrowing Assad by the “DEI” friendly HTS terrorists.
Netanyahu may feel he has the opportunity to do the same in Iran, with US backing and the West being only too willing to turn a blind eye, hoping to overthrow the Islamic Republic and replace it with some form of pro-Israel, or at least neutral, government that would cut aid to the Palestinian resistance groups in Gaza and the West Bank or wherever they will end up in an enlarged Diaspora.
This is further bolstered by Trump’s statement that he wants Egypt and Jordan to absorb the population of Gaza “clearing out” the devastated area, presumably for Israeli settlement. Trump, of course, couched his idea loosely in “humanitarian” terms, saying:
“I’d rather get involved with some of the Arab nations, and build housing in a different location, where they can maybe live in peace for a change,”
Needless to say, Palestinian and Arab reaction has been uniformly swift and negative, with both Jordan and Egypt categorically refusing such an idea, and warning that such a move would threaten long-standing peace treaties with Israel.
It remains to be seen whether this is one of the “off the cuff” ideas that Trump periodically throws at the wall to see if they stick, or something that he is serious about. If the latter, then it is extremely concerning, as the US will be back in the business of ethnic cleansing, as it was in the 90s in Yugoslavia, and will almost certainly be used as a building block for war with Iran, as well as the Zionist and Evangelical drive for a third temple in Jerusalem.
Seth Ferris, investigative journalist and political scientist, expert on Middle Eastern affairs
