- President Donald Trump said he wants the US to take over the war-shattered Gaza Strip after Palestinians are displaced to neighbouring countries, and develop the territory so the “world’s people” will live there.
- Trump unveiled his shocking plan during a news conference with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who visited the White House on Tuesday for a bilateral meeting.
- Throughout the day, Trump stoked controversy by suggesting Palestinians would “love to leave” Gaza, spurring fears he would back an ethnic cleansing campaign.
- Hamas released a statement in response to Trump, saying his plans are “a recipe for creating chaos and tension in the region. Our people in the Gaza Strip will not allow these plans to pass”.
- Protesters gathered in Washington, DC, to slam Netanyahu’s visit, accusing Trump of inviting a “war criminal” into the White House.
- Israel’s war on Gaza has killed more than 61,700 people, according to a revised toll by the Gaza Government Media Office, which says thousands of missing people are now presumed dead. At least 1,139 people were killed in Israel during the Hamas-led attacks on October 7, 2023, and more than 200 were taken captive.
- World reaction to Trump’s comments on ethnic cleansing in GazaAs we’ve been reporting, US President Donald Trump’s shocking plan to take over the Gaza Strip after Palestinians are forcibly moved out has drawn sharp responses in the US and abroad.The Council on American-Islamic Relations called Trump’s plan an “absolute non-starter”, while rights group Amnesty International said it was “tantamount to destroying them [Palestinians] as a people”.See more global reactions here.
- A Palestinian flag flutters among the rubble of buildings destroyed during the Israeli offensive in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip on February 4, 2025 [Hatem Khaled/Reuters]
- People returning to northern Gaza with ‘permanent sense of displacement’Reporting from Gaza City, GazaThe northern part of Gaza has turned into more of a hell. There is nothing left for people.None of their homes are standing. The buildings that are standing have been severely burned and damaged. They are at risk of collapsing.There’s no water source. There are no food supplies available. There are no hospitals available. This makes it very difficult, particularly for people who are elderly or have health issues.Despite all of this, people are coming back. They choose to come back because they don’t have any other option.But people are coming back with a permanent sense of displacement.
- Palestinians struggle to maintain their daily lives among the rubble of buildings destroyed by Israel in Gaza City, Gaza on February 04, 2025 [Abed Rahim Khatib/Anadolu]
- Beautiful relationship’: Israel’s Ben-Gvir ecstatic about Trump’s Gaza commentsFar-right Israeli politician Itamar Ben-Gvir, who resigned as Netanyahu’s national security minister last month in objection to the Gaza ceasefire deal, is happy about the US president’s comments as he eyes a comeback.“Donald, this looks like the beginning of a beautiful friendship,” he wrote in a rare English post on X after the president said the US wants to “own” the enclave and develop it.In a separate post in Hebrew, Ben-Gvir said Trump is now touting a plan he has been proudly backing to “encourage migration” of Palestinians from Gaza.“When I said time and time again during the war that this was the solution to Gaza, they mocked me. Now it is clear: this is the only solution, this is the strategy for the ‘day after’. I call on the prime minister to announce adoption of the plan as soon as possible and to begin immediate practical progress,” Ben-Gvir said.Israel’s Channel 12 reported that Ben-Gvir has said the likelihood of his return to the Netanyahu coalition has increased.
- Itamar Ben-Gvir storms the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound with armed guards in December 2024 in one of his efforts to thwart a Gaza ceasefire [Itamar Ben-Gvir’s spokesperson/Handout via Reuters]
- Trump not ‘pretending’ what US wants in Gaza, unlike Biden administration: AnalystTrump’s plan to ethnically cleanse Palestinians in Gaza is absurd, says Hassan Mneimneh, scholar and analyst with the Middle East Institute.“It is obscene. But in terms of it being proposed, we’ve witnessed more than a year of impunity on the part of Israel, enabled by the United States,” he told Al Jazeera.“The Biden administration was somehow shy in this enablement and participation in war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza because it pretended that there were higher purposes at play. With the Trump administration, the pretension and claims are not there,” he said.Mneimneh said Trump’s comments are an abject display of force that ignores and bypasses any law and speaks of Palestinian territory in a trivial fashion as if the US is entitled to claim Gaza the way he has made claims on Greenland and Panama.The difference, he added, is that tens of thousands of people have been killed in Gaza and their way of life has been destroyed by Israel’s war.“Can he actually take action? Evidently, because in support of Israel, he would do that. There will absolutely be resistance. It’s not a done deal but it’s a passing from the rules-based order towards a new reality in which the US and Israel present themselves as being right.”
LIVE: Trump wants US to ‘take over’ Gaza after removal of Palestinians
