US lawmakers slam Trump’s proposal as ‘ethnic cleansing’
US lawmakers have decried President Donald Trump’s proposal for resettlement of Gazans elsewhere and taking ownership of Gaza as ‘ethnic cleansing’.
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Muslim Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib condemned Trump’s remarks, saying he is “openly calling for ethnic cleansing” in the besieged territory.
Tlaib made the remarks in a post on X on Tuesday, after Trump said that the US will take over and own Gaza during a joint press conference with visiting Israeli prime minister earlier in the day, which drew widespread condemnation.
“This president is openly calling for ethnic cleansing while sitting next to a genocidal war criminal,” Tlaib said.
“He’s perfectly fine cutting off working Americans from federal funds" while the funding to the Israeli regime continues flowing, she added.
Trump said the US would take over the war-ravaged Gaza Strip and develop it economically after Palestinians are resettled elsewhere, adding that it will be something that the entire West Asia region “can be very proud of.”
The announcement followed Trump's shock proposal for the permanent resettlement of more than two million Palestinians from Gaza to neighboring countries earlier in the day and calling the blockaded territory a "demolition site."
He also said Palestinians would "love" to leave their embattled homeland in Gaza and live elsewhere if given an option.
Democratic US Senator Chris Murphy also described “as a bad joke” Trump’s remarks on Gaza, stressing, “We aren’t taking over Gaza.”
“He’s totally lost it. A US invasion of Gaza would lead to the slaughter of thousands of US troops and decades of war in the Middle East. It’s like a bad, sick joke,” Murphy said in a post on X.
He further noted that Trump’s comments were intended to distract the media and people “from the real story – the billionaires seizing government to steal from regular people.”
Last week, Trump suggested cleaning out the Palestinian land and relocating the war-stricken people there to neighboring Arab countries, namely Egypt and Jordan.
During the over 15 months of the Israeli regime’s genocidal war against the people of Palestine, more than 61,000 were killed, most of them children and women.