Benoit Faucon and Summer Said
WSJ, Mar. 5, 2025
“Crucially, the proposal includes few details about ridding Gaza of Hamas’s armed militants, who held sway for a decade and a half before the war.”
The White House has rejected an Arab plan for rebuilding the Gaza Strip, an early indication of the strength of President Trump’s commitment to positions he has staked out on contentious foreign-policy issues.
Arab governments have scrambled to come up with a plan after Trump laid out a proposal for the U.S. to take over the territory and redevelop it as an international destination after clearing out its Palestinian residents. The Arab proposal nodded to the president’s vision of a “Riviera of the Middle East,” calling for the eventual development of beachfront resorts.
But the White House shot down the proposal, saying the extent of the destruction in Gaza made keeping Palestinians in the enclave unworkable. Critics of the plan also said it failed to spell out how it would disarm Hamas, the U.S.-designated terrorist group that led the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks on Israel that left 1,200 dead and triggered the war.
The rejection makes clear that Trump won’t easily give up on an idea that has been criticized by governments around the world and surprised some of his aides and own party. It is also a sign of the challenges facing countries from Canada to Ukraine in trying to steer Trump to more palatable outcomes in disputes of their own.