Egypt planning ’emergency’ Arab summit on Palestinian territory as Trump insists US ‘own’ Gaza
Fox News
Egypt announced on Sunday it will host a summit of Arab leaders on Feb. 27 to discuss the future of the Gaza Strip after President Donald Trump signaled he wants the U.S. to own it.
Trump’s stunning declaration, made last week after meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and reiterated over the weekend, rankled key U.S. allies in the Middle East, including Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Jordan.
Egypt’s foreign ministry said the meeting in Cairo would include discussions on “the state of Palestine that asked to hold the summit in order to discuss new and dangerous developments for the Palestinian cause.”
Gaza’s Arab neighbors also dismissed Trump’s calls for them to take in the 1.8 million Palestinians still living in the Strip.
While many of Trump’s allies surmised the bold suggestion was a negotiating tactic, Trump reasserted to reporters Sunday night as he was leaving the Super Bowl that he was committed to “buying and owning” Gaza.
“I’m committed to buying and owning Gaza. As far as us rebuilding it, we may give it to other states in the Middle East to build sections of it. Other people may do it through our auspices. But we’re committed to owning it, taking it, and making sure that Hamas doesn’t move back,” he said.
“There’s nothing to move back in to. The place is a demolition site… The remainder will be demolished,” he added. “But we’ll make it into a very good site for future development by somebody.”
The ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, agreed to in January and partially brokered by Trump’s team, calls for a three- to five-year reconstruction phase, but Trump officials now insist it will take more like 10 to 15 years to rebuild the 139-square-mile territory that has been leveled by Israel’s offensive against Hamas.
Trump insisted Palestinians do not want to go back to Gaza.
“We’re going to make sure they live beautifully and in harmony and peace and that they’re not murdered,” he said. “They don’t want to go back to Gaza. They only go back because they have no alternative.”
TRUMP REMAINS COMMITTED TO US OWNING GAZA, SAYS MIDDLE EAST STATES COULD HELP REBUILD WAR-TORN AREA
Jordan’s King Abdullah II is due to meet with Trump at the White House on Tuesday, and Trump is expected to hold talks with Egyptian President Abdul Fattah al-Sisi and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in the coming days.
The Palestinian terror group Hamas on Sunday called Trump’s latest comments “absurd.”
“Gaza is not a property that can be bought and sold, and it is an integral part of our occupied Palestinian land,” Izzat al-Risheq, a member of the Hamas political bureau, wrote on Telegram.
“Dealing with the Palestinian issue with the mentality of a real estate dealer is a recipe for failure,” al-Risheq added.
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“Our Palestinian people will thwart all displacement and deportation plans. Gaza belongs to its people.”
Also on Sunday, Israel began withdrawing from the Netzarim corridor in Gaza as Palestinians return to their homes there – both sides honoring a tenuous ceasefire that is expected to return home Israel’s remaining hostages.
However, negotiations for the mid- and long-term future are ongoing. Hamas wants all Israeli troops out of Gaza, while Israel wants Hamas eliminated.
Last week, White House national security adviser Mike Waltz suggested Trump’s comments would turn up the heat on the Middle East to find its own solutions.
“I think it’s going to bring the entire region to come with their own solutions,” Waltz mused about the comments on CBS on Wednesday.
Waltz went on, adding, “He’s not seeing any realistic solutions on how those miles and miles and miles of debris are going to be clear, how those essentially unexploded bombs are going to be removed, how these people are physically going to live there for at least a decade, if not longer, it’s going to take to do this.”