LONDON — The British government gently pushed back Wednesday at U.S. President Donald Trump’s incendiary pitch to displace Palestinians and turn Gaza into “the Riviera of the Middle East.”
U.K. Cabinet minister Steve Reed said the U.S. president deserved “credit” for helping to secure a cease-fire between Israel and Hamas. But he stressed that the U.K. still backs a two-state solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict and to Palestinians — who had lived through a “nightmare” — returning to their homes.
“The Palestinian civilians have been through a living nightmare for the last 14 months,” Reed, the environment secretary, told Sky News.
“They need to be able to return to their homes and then start to rebuild them. They will need an awful lot of support from the international community to do that.”
Reed was speaking after Trump used a White House press conference alongside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to vow that the U.S. would “take over the Gaza Strip” and own it “long-term” after Israel’s 15-month bombardment of the area, which followed the murderous Oct. 7, 2023 attacks by Hamas on Israel.
Trump argued that Egypt and Jordan — who have publicly pushed back at an earlier hint of such a plan — would resettle Palestinians from the “pure demolition site” left by Israel’s bombing campaign. Such a proposal would involve the displacement of 1.8 million people and has already sparked a strong backlash in the Middle East.
“We have an opportunity to do something phenomenal,” Trump said of Gaza’s future. “I don’t want to be cute, I don’t want to be a wise guy, but the Riviera of the Middle East, this could be something so magnificent.”
Reed told Times Radio in a follow-up interview Wednesday: “It absolutely is not for me to provide a running commentary on Donald Trump’s views on this situation.”
But he said the “view of the British government remains that the best way to get a long-term peace in the region is for a two-state solution with a secure Israel and a viable and free Palestinian state.
“And the first step towards that must be Palestinian civilians being able to return to their homes and starting to rebuild their shattered lives.”
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