Confusion, alongside some elation, reigns in Israel’s public and political class that remains unclear as to what United States President Donald Trump’s comments about Gaza really mean.
For the extreme right and ultra-Orthodox factions of Israeli politics, the idea makes sense – that the population of Gaza be displaced to make way for the US to oversee some kind of reconstruction that they assume would ultimately be for the people of Israel.
Some analysts, however, saw the dysfunction in Trump’s bombastic remarks about land he has no claim to and that is inhabited by its people, pointing out that such brute force could just as easily be applied to Israelis in illegal settlements all over the Palestinian West Bank.
A poll by Israeli Channel 13 showed that, while 72 percent of Israelis liked US President Donald Trump’s idea that the US control the Gaza Strip, only 35 percent thought it would ever be implemented.
Equally unclear to observers across Israeli politics is how Trump’s off-the-cuff remarks can fit in with the three-stage ceasefire deal negotiated between Hamas and Israel to end months of Israel’s unrestrained war on Gaza.
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Promises
The belief that Palestine is Israel’s by some sort of divine right has been the stated justification for actions by politicians like self-described “fascist homophobe” Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, right-wing provocateur and former National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, and settler movements such as Nachala, which organised a conference in January last year to discuss colonising Gaza.
The ceasefire agreement, which meant Israel would have to stop bombing Gaza, disappointed the extreme right who seemed to want the assault to continue until Israel could claim the entire enclave.
In the build-up to the signing of the deal on January 17, both Smotrich and Ben-Gvir threatened to resign from the government in objection to its conditions.
Only Ben-Gvir quit, but he left behind his Otzma Yehudit party in the governing coalition, making his move seem performative to many observers.
Smotrich was “persuaded” to remain in return for assurances from Netanyahu that he had no intention of honouring the deal signed with Hamas and would resume the war once the first stage had been completed.
Aspirations
At first sight, Trump’s outlandish idea appears to offer the far right the end goal of controlling Gaza.
“Trump went much further than anyone expected,” Mitchell Barak, an Israeli pollster and former political aide to senior Israeli figures, including Netanyahu, told Al Jazeera.
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“In the short term, what Trump has delivered is better than what Smotrich and Ben-Gvir could have hoped for.”
Ben-Gvir quickly said the possibility of ethnically cleansing Gaza might be enough to persuade him to forget past grievances and return to the government.
“We have a huge opportunity and we must not miss it,” he told Galey Israel Radio on Wednesday. “There were those who worked on it in Israel long before and earned nicknames like ‘messianic and delusional’.”
Nachala claimed to be readying itself to seize Gaza as soon as its people, under the terms set out by Trump, were ethnically cleansed.
However, Barak pointed out: “They’re [Israel’s far right] not going to decide how this thing will end; Trump will, and part of his plan is to find a solution for Palestinians. That could still involve some kind of two-state solution,” referring to the creation of a Palestinian state alongside Israel.
“If Trump has the power to depopulate Gaza, he also has the power to relocate Israelis from the settlements,” Barak warned.
Confusion
There was not much detail in Trump’s remarks.
He did not say if he was advocating for trashing the decades-old US policy of seeking a two-state solution for Palestine, if he was suggesting a temporary ethnic cleansing of Gaza, or how his idea sat within the painstakingly negotiated three-phase ceasefire agreement.
Reporting from The Times and other outlets has suggested that large parts of Trump’s announcement appear to have been made without the prior consultation of aides or allies, accounting for much of the international backlash from states unaware of his proposals, and the swift caveating of the President’s plan by Secretary of State Marco Rubio and White House Spokesperson Karoline Leavitt, who clarified that the president’s proposals were temporary and did not represent a US military commitment to Gaza.
“Let’s say we take Trump seriously,” former Israeli ambassador and government adviser Alon Pinkas said to Al Jazeera.
“Israel has to commit to the deal and see it through to at least the second phase [when the population transfer might take place].
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“Now, say we don’t? Hamas still has no incentive to stay with the ceasefire. They and everyone else in Gaza, all 2.3 million, will be kicked out anyway. Where’s their motivation to keep with the ceasefire agreement?
“Ben-Gvir, Smotrich and others are at least clear in what they want [the ethnic cleansing of Gaza]. They don’t trouble themselves with obscure concepts, such as international law, which Netanyahu has to,” he said of the lip service paid to international norms by the Israeli premier.
Spoilers
If the US ethnically cleanses Gaza, even temporarily, Smotrich, Ben-Gvir and their allies would feel closer to their long-nurtured hope of colonising it than they have ever been before.
If, as Pinkas suggests, Trump’s intervention leads to the collapse of the ceasefire, they at least get the return to the war they supported through 15 months of unrestrained carnage.
In both cases, Netanyahu would likely emerge stronger, either through a unified and combined cabinet or as a war leader, defending what he frames as the “Jewish homeland”.
Even the threat of an early election, Barak suggested, may play to the prime minister’s end.
“New elections would make any government a transitional one,” he said, referring to the various challenges the government faces in addition to the potential threat posed by its right, such as the upcoming budget and the debate over drafting Israel’s ultra-Orthodox, “meaning it wouldn’t have to overcome any of those hurdles. Anything that gives Netanyahu time is always good for him. He’s done this before.”
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“By putting the transfer plan on the table, Trump has pushed Ben-Gvir and Smotrich much closer to Netanyahu,” Israeli political analyst Nimrod Flashenberg said of Netanyahu’s recent challenges from his right flank.
“Ben-Gvir has said that this brings him closer to getting back to the government and Smotrich said that this declaration makes the preservation of the government more critical,” he continued, referencing their stated readiness to support the government through at least stage II of the three-phase ceasefire if the endgame is the ethnic cleansing of Gaza.
