President Donald Trump is flirting with a poison pill that would ruin his America First, MAGA agenda.
Tuesday evening, Trump proposed the U.S. occupy Gaza in his joint press conference with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. (Subscribe to MR. RIGHT, a weekly newsletter about modern masculinity)
“The U.S. will take over the Gaza Strip, and we will do a job with it, too,” Trump declared. “We’ll own it and be responsible for dismantling all of the dangerous unexploded bombs and other weapons on the site. Level the site and get rid of the destroyed buildings. Level it out. Create an economic development that will supply unlimited numbers of jobs and housing for people of the area.”
“The U.S. will take over the Gaza Strip, and we will do a job with it, too.” –President Donald J. Trump pic.twitter.com/aCqLl9Gwwn
— President Donald J. Trump (@POTUS) February 5, 2025
The day of his inauguration, Trump the businessman described Gaza as if it were a prime slice of real estate ripe for development.
“You know, Gaza’s interesting, it’s a phenomenal location, on the sea, the best weather. Everything’s good. Some beautiful things could be done with it,” Trump said, also telling a reporter who asked if he and the United States would help with its rebuilding.
“I might,” Trump said.
Well, Trump says a lot of things that never come to fruition. It’s possible, even likely, that he is saying something absurd as a litmus test to shake things up and freak out the media before he pursues a more pragmatic strategy. Maybe he thinks his bold proposal can be used as a bargaining chip somewhere down the line. (Subscribe to MR. RIGHT, a weekly newsletter about modern masculinity)
That being said, the very idea of illegally claiming ownership of Gaza is as farcical as it is insidious — and it deserves to be shot down and ridiculed.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and U.S. President Donald Trump hold a press conference in the East Room of the White House in Washington, D.C. on February 4, 2025. (Photo by Bryan Dozier / Middle East Images / Middle East Images via AFP) (Photo by BRYAN DOZIER/Middle East Images/AFP via Getty Images)
The 2 million Palestinians living in Gaza do not want to leave, and other countries in the Middle East do not want to take them in. How would the U.S. go about removing and housing 2 million Palestinians? It’s logistically impossible without sending in masses and masses of U.S. troops, spending trillions of dollars, and coordinating with regional powers who would not want to play ball, to say nothing of how evil it is. Let’s liquidate Gaza, and get thousands of Americans killed in the process, so Jared Kushner can build a fancy beachfront resort. Fantastic idea, and I’m sure poor people in rural Kentucky will be thrilled to hear they have the opportunity to spend spring break at the five-star Kushner Hotel, where they will be catered to by a Palestinian olive farmer whose entire family was obliterated by an Israeli drone strike.
🚨AOC Addresses Trump’s Claims of Taking Over the Gaza Strip🚨
“It is horrific. It is the definition of ‘ethnic cleansing’. It is part of the culmination of–what I view–to be genocide of the Palestinian people. This is genuinely one of the most horrific humanitarian… pic.twitter.com/GImL6p96Vy
— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) February 5, 2025
Trump is flirting with a bona fide poison pill, a foreign policy disaster, à la George W. Bush, that would do irreparable damage to his agenda. Bush 3.0. The Bush Junta. It’s Iraq-War level bad. Afghanistan-level bad. A reprehensible boondoggle. A complete waste of blood and treasure. Trillions more in debt. Countless innocent lives were lost, American and Palestinian. You can picture the neocons still swimming around the D.C. swamp, silently breaking the surface, poking their lizard eyes out and licking their chops. If only we could get another shot at nation-building. It will work this time, so long as we send in enough troops and drop enough bombs, we can turn the desert into shiny, beautiful glass.
But Trump was not elected to be Bush 3.o. He was not elected to entangle the United States in more endless foreign wars and invade another country. He was not elected to send troops into the Middle East to die for Halliburton’s stock price and Jared Kushner’s dream real estate deal. Both his first and second elections were supposed to be an indictment of the feckless Pentagon blob that spills blood and burns cash like it is nobody else’s business. He was elected to put America First. (RELATED: Here’s The Latest Evidence Kamala’s Tour With Liz Cheney In Michigan Might Have Backfired Big Time)
And in order to put America First, Trump must first resist the temptation of intervention, lest he risk another two decades of death and debt.
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