President Donald Trump welcomed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to the White House on Tuesday, the first foreign leader to visit in his second term, by floating the idea that the United States should take ownership of the Gaza Strip and permanently displace all Palestinians living there.

After describing the Gaza Strip as a hellish environment, Trump told reporters that he wants to expel “all” Palestinians from Gaza — not just during a period of reconstruction following the Israel–Hamas war, but permanently. Trump suggested that current residents of Gaza can instead “occupy all of a beautiful area with homes and safety, and they can live out their lives in peace and harmony, instead of having to go back and do it again.”

In recent days, Trump had proposed plans to temporarily relocate Palestinians living in Gaza to neighboring countries of Egypt and Jordan, which were rejected by those nation’s leaders.

Along with the cleansing of Gaza’s Palestinian population, Trump proposed a U.S. takeover of the Strip.

“The U.S. will take over the Gaza Strip, and we will do a job with it too.”

“The U.S. will take over the Gaza Strip, and we will do a job with it too,” Trump said during a press conference alongside........

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