I know it's pointless to ask, but . . .
Aside from everything else, why does Donald Trump want Gaza? What possible use is it to the United States? Am I missing something obvious here?
159 thoughts on “Why does Trump want Gaza?”
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He wants it because he seems to be some version of insane.
Trump isn't going to want Gaza for any rational reason. The 'rational' reason is only their to validate his real motivation,
people like him love nothing better than a helpless victim they can further abuse, and that's the only thing he sees in Gaza.
er, 'there'.
It's brilliant! Miles of beachfront property. Whose idea was it to give it to the Palestinians in the first place? Think of the hotels. Think of the golf courses. I wonder why no one thought of this before? This is what happens when you install a very stable genius into the Oval Office.
Jared Kushner openly talked about this last year. He reportedly talked about it with Trump before Trump’s announcement last night. They see the Gaza Strip as a huge source of development $$$$, almost certainly for their family:
“ Jared Kushner has praised the “very valuable” potential of Gaza’s “waterfront property….. Gaza’s waterfront property could be very valuable …”
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/mar/19/jared-kushner-gaza-waterfront-property-israel-negev
“According to Kushner's vision, Gaza and the West Bank could, "just like Dubai and Singapore," benefit from their strategic location to become a regional financial center.”
https://www.dw.com/en/jared-kushners-plan-for-palestinians-whats-not-in-it/a-49350560
Good lord, this is beyond stupid. The world is chock full of waterfront property--there are 46,000 kilometers of it on the Mediterranean alone, including vast tracts that are not hotly contested warzones. What makes property valuable is proximity to other things that are valuable. That's why waterfront-ish property in Manhattan is worth millions per acre, and waterfront-ish property in, say, Biloxi is worth an order of magnitude or two less.
And any pitch for Gaza becoming "a regional financial center" like Dubai or Singapore would have to explain why Tel Aviv (just a few miles away) isn't already such a center.
I read an article few weeks back about how much unexploded ordnance was probably sitting under those collapsed buildings. (Hmm - Jaun Cole's Informed Comment, maybe?)
That's going to be a hairy cleanup job!
Tel Aviv 🙂
They are too busy worshipping their golden calf.
I think the idea is that the Trump Family will treat Gaza much in the same way that organized crime treated casinos. What matters most is the volume of money and the ability to skim even a tiny percentage off the top. The assumption seems to be that the Arab states and rather USA and its allies will pour money into rebuilding Gaza and if the Trumps can basically just wet their beaks it will be a huge score for them.
^^^yes! This~ Kushner has talked about it since before the buffoon was elected.
Interestingly, that was a goal of Egypt's when they kicked Hamas out of the Sinai in mid-2023. (At least if you believe the Egyptian press.)
I know you're being sarcastic, but here's a serious response.
The whole south coast of the Mediterranean is beachfront, much of it very nice sandy beaches with little wave action, making it unattractive to surfers but appealing to people who want to swim and splash in warm water without worrying about being swept away by undertows. In consequence there are beach resorts spread from Morocco to Egypt, patronized mostly by Europeans.
In short, would-be developers of Gaza face fierce competition. Given his background I would hope that even Trump could figure that out.
Oh, but casinos! It could be the vice capitol of the Mediterranean!
With what Israel has done over the last two years, why would you not consider Gaza the "vice" capital? Raping and killing by Israelis (against their own Ten Commandments) has been going on for quite a while.
I suspect this is another load of chum to get the media completely distracted. They were starting to notice the utter destruction that was being done by Elon Musk and his child army, so this is a big performance act to create headlines and obsessive analysis. Nothing will actually happen.
There is nothing to suspect, distraction is clearly the point.
Any day when the FBI /DOJ cleanup and Musk attack on the federal government are not the top news is a win for Trump.
It is depressing how well it works for him.
Yeah, he can always count on the traveling media corps to go after any bloody scrap he throws in front of them. And he knows they'll be looking to get themselves shown confronting him with an instant-reaction "tough question" like NBC did with O'Donnell yesterday, or to get an above-the-fold story about a "bold new plan for Gaza." That's time and space that won't feature illegal firings, illegal data giveaways, wilding through the constitution, Republicans selling out themselves and us for a mess of pottage and congratulating themselves for it.
The attention economy is the one thing I can think of that he both understands in his bones and has systematically studied and worked out. He has media in his pocket and always has.
+1*
*Agree that he understands in his bones the attention economy, but I don't think he has "systematically" studied anything.
This a thousand times.
🎯
What’s are the distractions hiding? My money is still on voter suppression. They’ve already installed a VP/Speaker firewall insuring no electoral count giving Dems a victory will ever be certified. While they have the trifecta their next goal will be locking in GOP victories by eradicating impure votes from poor and minorities, aka the folks first to be screwed by 2.0.
The Trump aura will come and go but GOP supremacy will reign forever. A smooth transition from Oligarchy to Autocracy
+1
I wonder if he maintains a list of outrageous things to say and releases them when needed, or just whips them up on the fly.
It doesn't need to. Talking bulshit is what he does naturally.
What he does quite well is calibrating the bulshit to the audience.
True re: "It's always about the real estate." Other than showboaring and doubling down, leaning into a fight, and repeating 3 to 5 word lies that sound like advertising jingles ad nauseum, Trump fancies himself a real estate guy. So: Gaza = money. Greenland, Panama, Canada. He'd want Mexico if it didn't come with Mexicans. Also Trump's approval of Musk taking over government virtual real estate. Trump's got a simple answer to all the world's problems. Turn them into privately owned profitable fiefdoms.
Actually he probably thinks in more grandiose terms. He wanted, and still wants to be seen as a "developer" of high end hotels, golf courses, and casinos. Built with OPM (Other People's Money), of course.
What's amusing is that his hotel in Vega doesn't have a casino. Snopes has a somewhat confused article about that - he got stakes in other Companies that had casinos, but never pursued one for his own casino. claiming that was his decision. Sure thing, Donnie...
You are forgetting that that Donnie's casinos tend to go bankrupt.
"Am I missing something obvious here?"
Yes. You're missing that Trump is a moron in the early stages of dementia.
Early stages?
This sure does seem like the latest shiny objet problem.
Who the hell knows why. The real question is why Israel would go along with the idea because clearly they want it for themselves. It's probably an attempt to get a real estate deal in Gaza. This is him trying to drop a hint. Apparently he thinks he could intimidate Israel. He's such a ridiculous person. Ridiculous and dangerous.
This is a common misconception, people often conflate Gaza and the West Bank but they are very different in the right wing Isreali psyche. They definitely want the West Bank but would be more than glad if Gaza floated off into the Sea.
I haven’t heard of any uniquely Jewish historical name particular to Gaza, as ‘Judaea and Samaria’ are to the West Bank, but I remember when Israeli settlers had to be dragged out of Gaza by the IDF. ‘From the river to the sea’ was first a Likud slogan.
It was a Zionist slogan well before Likud.
"The real question is why Israel would go along with the idea"
I'm sure Israeli expansionists would be thrilled if the US agreed to supply the extraordinary military resources and cost it would take to ethnically cleanse the area of the millions of Palestinians who live there, as well as the moral and reputational hit it such ethnic cleansing would entail.
Moreover, once so emptied, it's not like the area would be repopulated with many Americans. So, hardline Israeli elements would get what they want, and sucker Americans would be the ones to pay for it in every sense of the word.
100% this idea is a thrill for Israel. The US does all its dirty work, Israelis and the Jewish diaspora settle there in droves. The international oligarchy makes its usual fortunes.
And who knows? Maybe in a few decades it can be handed over peacefully anyway, now that those pesky indigenous Palestinians are so long gone.
donnie has set up the basics of a deal. Then Bibi came back and said, we will consider it if you clean up your malfunctioning weapons you sold/gave to us, etc. and so on.
josef, you said it correctly.
Kevin and the comments are missing something. True, Trump is inexplicable and a moron, and true, he's greedy. But that's just part of the picture. Break it down this way.
(1) Getting rid of the Palestinians and claiming "river to the sea" is the position of the Israeli far right.
(2) Trump's instincts match up with anyone on the authoritarian right and any criminal head of state,, including his and the American's right fear and hatred of Arabs.
(3) Trump has a way of saying aloud the outrageous things that Republicans usually keep to the themselves but earnestly promote. Here goes again.
(4) This being Trump, his instincts in executing the scary policies of others, immediately say, "How can I make a buck out of this?" So again, here he goes even if it undermines the first point of a united Israel. It's just as his sending "guests" to his hotels.
I'm not saying the Israeli right will know how to cope with the contradictions. And I'm not saying that Palestinians and youth on campus don't mirror the hopes of "river to the sea" and get rid of those who live there. But it's not relevant to Kevin's question: just how extreme, irrational, and greedy is Trump?
Oh, and my problem with those on the left pushing for a one-state solution isn't that they're too far to the left. I'm not a centrist. It's that they're so darn stupid. They asked for Trump, and now he does worse for them than Biden, who worked hard for a two-state solution, a cease fire, and humanitarian aid. So will they now feel regrets? Who these days ever does, left, right, and center?
Biden worked hard for those things? He asked Israel to be minimally decent, they said no, and he pledged the US endless support to Israel. In what world does that count as working hard. The ceasefire happened after Trump was elected.
It is not surprising that Trump is calling for war crimes while Biden tepidly spoke against them. But it is far from clear that the Palestinians are any worse off. Given US blind support for Israel, pressure on Israel was always going to come from Europe and other power sources other than the US. And Trump being a buffoon does not help Israel, and so could help the Palestinians.
I certainly voted against Trump, but the idea that Biden was doing anything useful for the Palestinians seems pretty silly.
" And Trump being a buffoon does not help Israel, and so could help the Palestinians."
good grief
Kevin is not the only one hopelessly naive here
True a lot of people seem to think that Biden did the Palestinians some good.
"And Trump being a buffoon does not help Israel, and so could help the Palestinians."
And in the end, to conclude that Trump may be better than Biden for the Palestinians is why many people look at the pro-Palestinian left and conclude these are people dumber-than-MAGA and should not be taken seriously ever again.
Two responses to my argument and not a hint of an argument in either of them. No doubt the Palestinians fed their children well with the kind words of the Biden administration.
There is no question that there are people who look at the pro-Palestinian left and think they do not deserve to be taken seriously. But then there are Trump supporters who think that liberals do not deserve to be taken seriously. What neither group seems to have are arguments. That used to be the currency of liberals.
It is possible that liberals are simply in denial about how cruel Israel has been to the Palestinians for decades. Drum clearly is. But the fact that the only response to me so far has been "nuh-uh" suggests the problem may lie elsewhere.
Your response makes me think the people that don't take your side seriously are right after all.
I used to think you were knowledgeable, and probably you are. But your judgment looks about as bad as any on the planet. To think Trump could be better for Palestinians is a staggering statement. What has Trump said lately? He plans to remove all Palestinians from Gaza and make Gaza a US territory. After hearing cries of genocide for more than a year, where is the outrage from you and the pro-Palestinian left today? You're smart enough to understand what ethnic cleansing is. And you know that removing millions of people from their land does not happen peacefully. Yet here you are at this late date still upset more at Biden than Trump.
Yes, I think Biden was better than Trump. Biden has his faults and is not without criticism. For one thing, he may have calculated that the pro-Palestinian voting bloc was wise enough to vote in their own best interests. That was not to be.
The election was about a lot more than the fate of Palestine, and to think that the result may have landed a fatal blow to the democratic project that began 248 years ago is a fear many of us have. It would be a tragedy beyond words.
You can take your argument and do whatever you want with it. For the time being, and for as far as anyone can see, it is a moot point.
The task now for the rest of us is to save what's possible to be saved from the ongoing destruction of America.
Safe travels. Salam, shalom, peace. If you can find it.
Your reply makes me think you didn't bother to try to understand the point you were responding to.
First, do you think there has been no response to Trump's idiocy? Trump has united the world against Trump and Israel. It is an open question what the world will do about it, but so far Gazans have been better under Trump than under Biden. Whether Trump deserves credit for that is hard to say. But that it has been better so far is not.
The question is whether it is better to have the US respond to Israel's atrocities by denying they are happening, as Biden largely did, or by applauding Israel for them. I think even Netanyahu knows that Israel could get away with more when Bided was denying it was happening than when Trump is calling it genius.
Note that in Trump's first term he put forward a supposed peace plan. What was the result of that plan which called for endless apartheid in Israel? The Saudis were forced to abandon peace talks with Israel and human rights groups lost their inhibitions about calling Israel an apartheid state. I have no doubt the Palestinians hated Trump's proposal. But I also have no doubt they were happy about the effects of that proposal. It was under Biden that the peace talks with the Saudis looked like they were going to start up again (one of the possible motivations for the 10/7 attack).
But in a UN club there is no question what Trump has done is worse. That is if you ignore the actual suffering of the Palestinians Biden was OK.
I don’t have an argument against your position, reality does. Trump’s proposal that the US commit a crime against humanity by ‘ethnically cleansing’ Gaza, forcibly displacing an entire population from its homeland, clears a path for Netanyahu to commit less drastic yet illegal acts, and seem like the ‘reasonable alternative’. I can safely assert that President Biden would not have proposed displacing Palestinians to make way for neo-colonialists.
You mean that Netanyahu may displace 2 million people, slaughter tens of thousands of civilians, attack aid workers, destroy every hospital in the territory, extend the attacks to the West Bank and Lebanon? Yes those things are awful, but they are what Israel did under Biden, so that would hardly be worse.
But at least while Biden was supplying Israel with the weapons with which they committed this war crimes, at least he wasn't saying mean things about Palestinians? Is that supposed to be the point?
What Biden did was to misrepresent what was happening as Israel wanting peace with Hamas avoiding it. He even called the peace plan that Israel rejected until the threat of Trump taking over the Israeli peace plan as if Israel accepted it and Hamas did not. By contrast Trump is making it clear that Israel commits its war crimes because it wants the result of the war crimes.
I don't know why Israel agreed to a cease fire only with Trump coming into office, but that is something Biden failed to achieve for more than a year. The answer could well be because even Netanyahu understands that having the US cheerlead war crimes is not in Israel's interest.
Reality says that before the election of Trump there was no hint of a cease fire and after there is a cease fire. Sometimes reality can be misleading. But when reality is against your point as it is here, you need arguments not just hurumphs.
Curiously, Netanyahu’s disagreements with Defense Minister Yoav Gallant resulted in the latter’s dismissal on November 5, 2024, sparking protests by the public. Gallant wanted more effort to get the hostages back; the public protests highlighted this issue; criticism of Netanyahu over it had been growing and was now open and widespread.
I tend to think that most history is homemade, and that in this instance it was domestic pressure to secure the return of the hostages, and the weakening position of the government coalition, that forced Netanyahu’s hand.
One can try to explain away reality, but it is hard in this case. Biden failed to get a cease fire in over a year. Israel agreed to the same terms it had been rejecting only a day or two before Trump took office. If Netanyahu thought Trump's buffoonery would be a plus he only had to wait two days and the Biden people would be gone. Any explanation that leaves out that Israel rushed to get a deal before Trump took over days later is not a serious explanation. That leaves open the question as to why Netanyahu needed the deal before Trump became president. But it is silly to pretend it was a coincidence.
So your argument comes down to: the incoming President, who had called on Israel to ‘finish the job’, has restarted shipments of 2000-pound bombs, and proposed a criminal ethnic cleansing of Palestinians, would have been less supportive of Israel’s criminal war on civilians than the outgoing President, who had been trying to negotiate a cease-fire for a year, and who was the one who had stopped the bomb shipments, and paused other weapons shipments.
What do you gain by purposely misunderstanding the point? My argument has been that Trump applauding Israel's war crimes is worse for Israel than Biden doing his best to minimize them. That you insist on assigning me a different argument suggests a level of dishonesty on your part.
Was there a point to your ramblings? Whatever your point may be about Palestinian rights and the wrongs done against them by Israel -- which are clearly long-standing and cruel -- THIS particular issue is a tiny ember compared to the ten-alarm fire occurring in Washington.
Was this a reply to me? I can't imagine it making sense to any comment here. After all this is a discussion of Trump and Gaza. I suppose it would make sense as a criticism of Drum for bringing up the topic, but it makes no sense in response to anyone else for being on topic.
wow. trump being a buffoon could actually help the palestinians? really? his election basically gives israel a free hand to do whatever it damn well pleases and the means to do it.
So no change then.
It really amazes me that so many people think that Biden asking Netanyahu to be nice while arming him and assuring him we would have his back no matter what constrained Israel in some way.
This really is not the mic-drop argument you think it is. Yes, Trump is a worse human being with less compassion and less concern about human rights. But that does not in any way mean the results of his actions will be worse for his intended victims.
Biden is, as far as I can tell, a decent human being. But that did less than nothing for Gazans, there is no serious counter argument to that fact. Biden spoke with concern, occasionally, about Gazan suffering, but did less than nothing to stop it.
Lon Becker's simple point that no one seems to be engaging with in good faith, is that, from the victim's point of view, a brazen and clumsy criminal can be preferable to a sophisticated member of established society when they are doing the same thing.
Thank you. I thought I was being clear enough. And I had the sense that the people responding were missing the point because they wanted to. But it is good to see that somebody could understand the point if they wanted to. You have captured my point exactly.
Other than working towards getting a cease fire right?
And before you say cut off all aid to Israel, there is no way Biden would do that or could do that given what monies are appropriated by Congress (which is a current debate going on right now) The Biden Administration did or tried to at lest limit the tonnage of bombs the Israelis could use but with Israel under attack from Iran and Hezbollah, no way was their ever going to be a complete cut-off in aid, not the least of which Biden has been an Israeli supporter throughout his career in Congress and that it is part of the legacy of the Democratic Party that the Israel even exists.
Sorry to disappoint you.
Actually less than nothing to stop it is a good description. He paid lip service to a cease fire. He also pretended that Israel was proposing a cease fire when he couldn't actually get them to agree to it. This atrocity washing of Israeli behavior is unfortunately a long standing practice of the US and may help explain the politics you describe in which Israel is treated like a country that would never do the things that it actually does routinely.
Biden not only put no pressure on Israel to agree to a cease fire (nothing) he actually opposed the countries that were trying to put pressure on Israel (less than nothing).
If you want to understand the disconnect between the far left's criticism of Biden, and their, frankly clueless, defenders, it lies in this denial of the role that the US has played in trying to normalize Israel's indefensible behavior.
Bibi deliberately ignored warnings from his own army for over a year. I wonder why no one has talked about this. Are they afraid to bring up GWBush ignoring warnings for months that led to 9-11?
I would think that this is talked about quite a lot in Israel and is a large part of the reason that Netanyahu has dragged out the war to prevent any kind of investigation of his failings.
Who do you think is afraid of bringing up W ignoring the warnings? Bush supporters, such as they are now, tend to be people who are happy to see the conflict escalate and so have no reason to criticize Netanyahu. And I don't see why anybody else would be afraid of the comparison.
Instead we just have the normal pattern of the people who fetishize violence claiming that it is inappropriate to point fingers so close to the violence. It is similar to what happens after every school shooting where talking about how our gun culture makes school shooting is supposedly insensitive to the victims of the latest school shooting,.
I have never met a TrueLeft® person who expressed regret for helping to put a Republican into power.
I remember the maniacs in "Students for a "Democratic" Society" [THAT's a rich one] arguing about 18 Brumaire at the one meeting I ever attended back in early 1965. They were planning a walk-out on Governor Rockefeller at Cornell's 100th Anniversary. [Cornell hosts a couple of New York State colleges so he was invited to be the Keynoter].
Completely ignorming the fact that the Governor had taken public positions questioning the wisdom of escalating the war which essentially killed his political future within the national Republican party, these idiots wanted to embarrass him because he represented "The Man".
There are a LOT of "TrueLeft® person(s)" who are dumb as a bucket of rocks, at least as regards to electibility and public policy.
Remember, that roughly eight times as many people have died under the tutelage of Communist parties as did under Hitler. Their deaths were at the hands of people who were just as insane as the SS ghouls.
People who would sacrifice human beings "to improve humanity" share a deeply corrupt narcissism, no matter what their particular "economics" may be.
Trump explained it to Access Hollywood:
"You know I'm automatically attracted to beachfront property. It gives me a hard-on, and at least it did in the days when I could still get it up. It makes me want to whack off and come all over it. I don't even wait. And when you're president, they let you do it. You can do anything. Grab 'em by the pussy. Erect a tower with your name on it in their sand. Maybe that's the only erection I'll ever have again, but they'll let me do anything."
By now, folks who have been around like forever ought to realize that Mr Drum likes to throw out these raw-meat postings to generate discussion. Not because he's terribly naive or whatever.
It's like chum in the water, only better.
👍👍👍 And he's good at it too.
It’s an obvious real-estate grab, but the chances of it being successful are low. Every other country in the world except possibly Israel will oppose this adamantly. (I say “possibly Israel” because while Bibi and the far right will love it, the irony of forced relocation of a people in order to gainn Lebensraum will not escape everyone.)
This will certainly increase terrorism and cement Hamas’s legitimacy, perhaps gaining them power in the West Bank as well.
In any case, even in the unlikely event that the U.S. takes over Gaza, that’s not likely to mean that Trump can just put a bow under it and present it as a gift to Jared.
It’s likely to take quite a few years before Gaza eould be in any shape for this kind of project, and that’s not even factoring in the likelihood of sabotage. Jared might also discover a certain loss of enthusiasm for some of his other plans, particularly with Saudi Arabia.
Finally, I’ll point out that there was already a "Riviera of the Middle East." It was called Lebanon.
It’s an obvious real-estate grab, but the chances of it being successful are low.
Low? Try non-existent. They're going to drive two million people out of Gaza at bayonet point?
The whole thing is completely bonkers. Trump is off his rocker—truly—and not one Republican is willing to say it. What should be happening is quiet discussions to invoke the 25th amendment. Trump is corrupt as fuck, sure. But he's also not in touch with reality.
Maybe the real plan is a threat to pull aid from Jordan and/or Egypt, then offer to reinstate it in exchange for Gaza suburbs. Doubt the Gazans will like it, but when has T ever cared about them?
Made you look!
That’s why. That’s the whole reason.
He thinks it's a real estate development opportunity that he could make lots of money on. That's it. There is no 3-D chess with this dope.
He told you straight to your face that he intends to turn it into a swanky beach resort. The words literally came out of his mouth.
Kevin: i Don'T uNDersTanD.
Might as well ask why a toddler or small child wants something. Often as not it is because someone else has it and s/he doesn't.
Meanwhile, don't focus on Gaza. Focus on Treasury, DoJ, FBI... to co-opt a saying, America First...
(Yes, of course there must be nuance/exceptions, but we can't/won't be able to address anything elsewhere unless and until we have our own house in order.)
Looking at this morning’s news I see this:
REPORTER: Yes or no, do you believe the US should take control of Gaza?
MIKE JOHNSON: We await further details on what exactly that looks like. This is a bold, decisive move, and I think you have to do something to eradicate the threat to Israel.
So, in the end, what we have here is Trump saying the most insane thing possible and watching smugly while Republicans line up to act like what he was saying is “bold and decisive”. Don’t know if he does this stuff on purpose but I’m sure he loves how well it works. Republicans really are a bunch of pathetic ass kissers.
And meanwhile the corruption of the FBI/DOJ and Musk's attack on the government are pushed out of attention. Mission accomplished.
> REPORTER: Yes or no, do you believe the US should take control of Gaza?
A better question would be "Do you believe the US should engage in the ethnic cleansing of Gaza?" No reason to cover it up with the innocuous sounding "take control".
Gaza is this week’s bright shiny object. At least it distracts Donald’s bit from last week’s bright shines objects, be it Greenland, Panama, Mexico, Canada or whatever,
Very true. Actually it already looks like it was Tuesday's bright shiny object.
You missed the point.
This is Trump very succesfully distracting the media (and American voters) from the corruption of the government, which is the main project as far as Trump is concerned.
actually it's more of the same. just more ridiculous.
Someone asked "Why not Australia?"
Why not indeed. Trump's plans for Gaza already echo the Randy Newman philosophy of foreign policy:
("Political Science")
Seriously though, sending US troops to control Gaza? If anything is going to spark another 9/11, this is it. Remember the last time we had US forces stationed in a Middle Eastern country was Saudi Arabia after the first Gulf War. Some fellow named Osama didn't like that very much.
As stupid as Trump's idea for Gaza is no Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia contains Islam's two holiest sites. Gaza is just the home to millions of Palestinians, a group that Arabs care about only when they are forced to.
We have had troops in other Arab countries without the kind of blowback that happened due to troops in Saudi Arabia. So Trump's suggestion would clearly anger the Arab world but more on the scale to which US support for Israeli abuse of the Palestinians already does than anything greater. The ethnic cleansing would likely be a bigger problem than the US troops.
It's the Gas, stupid. [A tip of the Hatlo Hat to James Carville]
His Jesus whisperers told him to...
TFM also needs to distract people from the $0.50/egg surcharge at the Waffle House. That’s going to bite a lot of MAGAts. Probably going to affect his popularity more than any insane/stupid/lying thing out of his pie hole.
He's also just riffing on the idea of deporting people, where he think the Sinai is the nearby equivalent of Mexico.
These constant head scratches and furrowed brow "why is he doing this" questions are rapidly progressing to infuriating, having left laughable and annoying far behind.
The guy is transparent and shallow. Greenland, Canada, Gaza...all just real estate acquisitions.
Just because something makes no sense to anyone with any intelligence and knowledge does not mean it makes no sense to Trump.
I think people are overthinking the real estate angle. It's more political. Under the Turks and then the British, Palestine was what is now Israel and Jordan. When the Brits pulled out, the Israelis took over what is now Israel, and the Hashemites took over what is now Jordan. Jordan is majority Palestinian, but especially since the attempted revolution in the early 1970s, Jordan has been an extremely repressive state. No one hears much about it, and no one talks about it.
Trump is pushing a long time political proposal that dates back to when Israel and Jordan separated. Gaza was originally a refugee zone, but no one was ever relocated out of it. There have been advocates for turning Jordan into a Palestinian state since the mid-1940s. You can argue the merits of this, but a lot of countries in the Middle East have been dominated by minority religious groups. In Iraq, it was the Sunnis ruling a majority of Shia. In Syria, it was the Alewites ruling a majority of Sunni. This was all part of the post-WW2 realignment (and also British colonial politics).
My personal feeling is that is a bad idea, particularly if the US actually invades. I don't think the Israelis would do well annexing the region either. Egypt, sensibly, considered it a hot potato since it was offered after the 1967 war. I have no idea what is going on in Jordan. It is deliberately opaque. I think we know more about North Korea or Eritrea. If, however, Jordan destabilizes, things would be different. This is unlikely. A lot of regional powers are perfectly happy with Jordan as it is. Odds are it is staying stable, but people were saying Assad was in charge of Syria until pretty recently.
Israeli observers believe Trump said what he said to help Netanyahu politically to keep his government in tact until the next election in 2026 because kicking out the Palestinians from Gaza is exactly what the extremists in Israel want to do. So Trump agrees U.S. troops should be in Gaza clearing out the rubble and rebuilding. But of course its all bullshit because the last thing Trump wants to do is put U.S troops on the ground to get shot at by Hamas. Kind of hard to build or even invest in rebuilding in the middle of a war zone, right?
Obviously the logical solution is allow Egypt to run security, the PA to run the administrative and the Gulf State to pay for rebuilding, a completely Arab solution to the problem. That's what the diplomacy should be working towards. If Trump/Rubio can't do this, then it will be an incredible failure and a black hole in his foreign policy. Because I know one place the Palestinians aren't going, the United States!
He wants to build a Trump resort there. Weren't you listening?
A bit of a late post but...
Hamas should welcome Trump. Invite him in. Your going to need a lot of laborers to help with your vision, and Palestinians don't cost much. We don't have to go anywhere--we can stay to help you.
Bibi will love it!!!