Updates: Trump officials walk back parts of plan to ethnically cleanse Gaza

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To know more about how Palestinians in Gaza reacted to US President Donald Trump’s proposal to remove them from the Strip to rebuild it into the “Riviera of the Middle East”, read this.

And here you can read more about how American politicians responded to Trump’s proposal for the US to “own” Gaza.

Here are four examples of Trump’s staunch support for Israel.

But before that, let’s bring you up to speed with the latest developments:

• At a White House briefing on Wednesday, Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt hailed Trump’s proposal to “take over” Gaza as historic, “outside of the box” thinking but stressed that the president had not committed to putting “boots on the ground” in the territory. She declined, however, to rule out the use of US troops there.
• She also said the US will not provide any funding for any transfer of Palestinians.
• Hamas has agreed to hand over the bodies of Shiri Bibas and her two children, Ariel and Kfir, after a request from Israel via mediators, Al Jazeera Arabic has reported.
• US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said that the Pentagon was prepared to look at all options when it came to Gaza, a day after Trump said that he would like the US to take control of and redevelop the Gaza Strip.
• Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi says that the international community “must bear its responsibility” and support the implementation of a two-state solution to the Israel-Palestine conflict.
• Al Jazeera’s correspondent reported that a child has been killed after being shot in the chest by an Israeli sniper in the vicinity of al-Awda Square in central Rafah.
• US Congressman Al Green has said that he was introducing impeachment articles against Trump over the president’s comments on Gaza.

Wasayef Abed woke up on Wednesday to murmurs among her fellow displaced Palestinians in central Gaza’s Deir el-Balah.

The discussion was centred on United States President Donald Trump and his announcement that the US would “take over” Gaza. In Trump’s comments, made as he stood next to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu – the man responsible for the decision to devastate Gaza in Israel’s war – the US president even said that Palestinians should move from the enclave permanently.

The 36-year-old Wasayef’s reaction is one of indifference.

“I didn’t pay much attention,” she said as she made her way to check on her rain-soaked tent.

“I don’t even own a mobile phone or any means of following the news,” she added indifferently, her tired face betraying her exhaustion.

“What I do know is that my mother and I will never leave Gaza, no matter what happens. All we are waiting for now is a way to return to our destroyed home in the north.”

Read more here.

Diana Buttu is a Palestinian international human rights lawyer who has previously been involved in negotiations with Israelis.

Often the only woman at the negotiating table, Diana brings a unique perspective to the complex dialogue surrounding peace.

In this episode of Now You Know, she shares her experiences navigating the challenges of high-stakes discussions and offers a firsthand account of life in the occupied West Bank.

Why is Donald Trump so obsessed with Gaza? The US president has proposed taking over the strip and relocating Palestinians.

It is a violation of international law and seemingly a call for ethnic cleansing.

But who can stop Trump’s plan?

The UN chief warned against ethnic cleansing in Gaza and the dehumanisation of Palestinians as he rejected President Donald Trump’s bombshell proposal for the US to take control of the Palestinian territory and displace all its people.

“At its essence, the exercise of the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people is about the right of Palestinians to simply live as human beings in their own land,” UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said in a speech to a UN committee that deals with the rights of Palestinians.

“We have seen the realisation of those rights steadily slip farther out of reach. We have seen a chilling, systematic dehumanisation and demonisation of an entire people. It is vital to stay true to the bedrock of international law. It is essential to avoid any form of ethnic cleansing.”

Hamas has agreed to hand over the bodies of Shiri Bibas and her two children, Ariel and Kfir, after a request from Israel via mediators, Al Jazeera Arabic has reported.

A source told Al Jazeera Arabic that the bodies had not been handed over until now because of Israel’s refusal to send heavy equipment into Gaza to retrieve them from under the rubble.

Shiri and her husband Yarden were taken captive on October 7, 2023, along with their children.

Yarden was released on Saturday, but Hamas has previously said that the rest of his family were killed in an Israeli air strike in November 2023.

It’s not so much of a walk-back as a complete U-turn in a way, because we heard President Trump stating specifically that the US was going to “own” Gaza – his words. His implication or direct statement was that the US was going to be at the forefront of translocating residents of Gaza into neighbouring territories.

Now, we hear from the press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, that this is not what he meant, that there will be no US boots on the ground, as she puts it, and the US will not provide any funding whatsoever towards any translocation.

And as well, reversing the president’s statement, which he made publicly, she said that this would be a temporary solution, not a permanent one as has been implied by the president. This was also echoed a little bit earlier by the Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who said that any such action in Gaza would be a temporary one.

That being said, neighbours and others in the area would resist very strongly even if the relocation was on a temporary basis. Arab nations would fight tooth and nail against any such act.

Trump’s advisers are supposed to be trumpeting what President Trump wants. They are the funnels for his desires, his executive orders. But they can only deal with what they have.

We had Karoline Leavitt saying what her boss had been saying and then now reversing it, obviously after consultation with President Trump himself.

Canada’s longstanding position on Gaza has not changed, Foreign Minister Melanie Joly has said.

In a post on X, Joly said that Canada remains “committed to achieving a two-state solution”.

“There is no role for Hamas in the governance of Gaza,” Joly added. “We support Palestinians’ right to self-determination, including from being forcibly displaced from Gaza.”

Canada’s longstanding position on Gaza has not changed.
We are committed to achieving a two-state solution, where Israelis and Palestinians can live securely within internationally recognised borders. 1/2

— Mélanie Joly (@melaniejoly) February 5, 2025

US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has said that the Pentagon was prepared to look at all options when it came to Gaza, a day after President Donald Trump said that he would like the US to take control of and redevelop the Gaza Strip.

“I would just say, on the question of Gaza, the definition of insanity is attempting to do the same thing over and over and over again,” Hegseth said before the start of his meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the Pentagon.

“The president is willing to think outside the box, look for new and unique, dynamic ways to solve problems that have felt like they were intractable … We’re prepared to look at all options,” Hegseth added.

Leaning on a wooden cane, 72-year-old Fathi Abu al-Saeed navigates the rubble-strewn streets of Khan Younis’s al-Katiba neighbourhood — a daily ritual since he returned from displacement in the coastal region of al-Mawasi following the January 19 Gaza ceasefire.

Carefully stepping over debris left by 15 months of relentless Israeli bombardment, he raises his cane, pointing at a demolished house.

“You see that pile of useless rubble?” he says. “That’s more precious than the United States and everything in it.”

Every morning, Abu al-Saeed exchanges words of resilience with neighbours. But on this day, US President Donald Trump’s recent remarks about Gaza – his fantasy of clearing out its Palestinian population to build a “Riviera in the Middle East” – offer new material for his sarcasm and defiance.

Read the full story here on how leaving Gaza for many Palestinians would be ‘”like death itself”.

A spokesperson for United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres was asked multiple times about Trump’s comments and the headline really is that the spokesperson said, repeating the obvious – and it’s obvious here in this building with anyone that follows international law – that “any forced displacement of people is tantamount to ethnic cleansing”.

Here at the UN headquarters in New York, spokespersons or top UN officials rarely want to address Trump directly. Over the last couple weeks, they have preferred to just answer questions as they are being asked of them, but very clearly this is being roundly rejected here at the UN.

We are told that the secretary-general did speak to the ruler of Jordan, King Abdullah, on the phone earlier on Wednesday. They spoke about the situation in the region. But we are expected to hear from the secretary-general himself in about one hour or so as he’s giving a preschedule appearance at a UN committee on the exercise of the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people.

As limited as the UN can be at times, it is the place where 193 nations come together and the real power of the UN is, number one: pressure.

There can be a buildup of world consensus that can come from the United Nations and that’s the real power that this body has moving forward.

It’s clear that the vast majority of member states here support a two-state solution, but also definitely reject any idea of Palestinians being forcibly removed from their land.

The power of the organisation is going to be key in the coming days, weeks, and months.

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi says that the international community “must bear its responsibility” and support the implementation of a two-state solution to the Israel-Palestine conflict.

The Egyptian president made the comments in a phone call with his French counterpart, Emmanuel Macron.

What has been made clear by the US president, and again what we just heard from the press secretary, is that the expectation by the Trump administration and by the US president himself is that it is the neighbouring Arab partners that will be paying for this.

What she said was, the US won’t pay, it will essentially be the US allies in the area who will pay for the reconstruction of Gaza.

We should point out that on Capitol Hill – these are co-equal branches of government, the White House and the US Congress – it’s Congress that controls the purse strings.

Congress did not know about this in advance and we heard that from top Republicans like House Speaker Mike Johnson earlier today. He said that they were surprised to get this plan when they heard about it in real time on Tuesday. They said that it was a surprising development.

And we’ve heard from other senior members on the Democratic side who say that this is “lunacy” and that they will file motions to block it. In other words, they don’t want to pay for it. The United States will not pay for this.

But we’ve already heard from partners like Egypt and Jordan that they are not willing to back this proposal.

Gaza should be an essential part of a future Palestinian state, a European Union foreign policy spokesperson has said, adding that the EU was committed to a two-state solution.

“We took note of President Trump’s comments. The EU remains firmly committed to a two-state solution, which we believe is the only path to long-term peace for both Israelis and Palestinians,” the spokesperson said.

“Gaza is an integral part of a future Palestinian state,” he added.

The organisation known as Arab Americans for Trump, a group that played a key role in helping Arab and Muslim voters in key swing states turn out for Trump in the 2024 election, announced it was changing its name to Arab Americans for Peace following Trump’s Gaza announcement.

“The president has yet to meet with key Arab leaders, including the Palestinian president, to hear their views regarding the acceptable path to a permanent peace process. We are adamantly opposed to the notion of transferring Palestinians outside of historic Palestine for ANY reason,” the group said.

The group noted it appreciated Trump’s “offer to clean and rebuild Gaza” but said “however, the purpose should be to make Gaza habitable for Palestinians and no one else”.

The US Secretary of State, speaking at a news conference while on a trip to Guatemala City, said this was a unique offer to step in and clear debris and destruction in Gaza, adding that people will have to live somewhere while it is rebuilt.

He said it was not meant as a hostile move and that details still needed to be worked out.