A “win-win solution”?
Likud minister proposes relocation of Gaza residents
November 20, 2023, 2:51 a.m
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The massive attacks by the Israeli military are leaving devastating destruction in the Gaza Strip. The Israeli Minister of Intelligence, Gila Gamliel, calls for the money to be saved for reconstruction. The people who live there should “build a new life in new host countries”.
Israeli Intelligence Minister Gila Gamliel called on the international community on Sunday to encourage a “voluntary resettlement” of Palestinians from the coastal area to other countries instead of rebuilding the Gaza Strip. Instead of providing money for the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip or the “failed” UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA), “the international community can contribute to the costs of the resettlement” and help the residents of the Gaza Strip “to find a new life in their new host countries,” Gamliel wrote on Sunday in the Jerusalem Post newspaper.
After the war, it would be an “option” to “promote the voluntary resettlement of Palestinians in Gaza outside the Strip for humanitarian reasons,” said the politician from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party.
All previous attempts at a solution have failed. Their proposal could be “a win-win solution: a victory for Gaza’s civilians who want a better life and a victory for Israel after this devastating disaster,” Gamliel continued.
Abbas fears “second Nakba”
On October 7th, hundreds of fighters from Hamas, classified as a terrorist organization by the USA and the EU, attacked Israel and committed atrocities there, mainly against civilians. According to Israeli figures, around 1,200 people were killed in Israel and around 240 people were taken hostage to the Gaza Strip.
In response to the Hamas attack, Israel began massive attacks on targets in the Gaza Strip and ground troops also entered the Palestinian territory. According to Hamas figures, which cannot be independently verified, around 13,000 people have been killed in the Gaza Strip since the Israeli attacks began around six weeks ago.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas warned in October of a “second Nakba” in light of an Israeli-ordered evacuation of more than a million people from the northern Gaza Strip as a result of the Hamas attack. With the term “Nakba” (catastrophe), Abbas referred to the flight or expulsion of around 760,000 Palestinians after Israel’s founding of the state in 1948.