Gaza Displacement Plan Enters Israeli Election Debate, Faces Regional Backlash

(MENAFN- Jordan Times) OCCUPIED JERUSALEM – Jordan and Arab and Islamic countries have recently issued a joint statement, condemning proposals by some Israeli ministers to expel Palestinians from the war-torn Gaza Strip.

The foreign ministers of Jordan, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Turkey, Egypt, Pakistan, and Indonesia have strongly condemned the statements made by Israeli far-right national security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir and defense minister Israel Katz on the displacement of the Palestinian people from the Gaza Strip, including proposals for plans and mechanisms aimed at forcibly removing Palestinians from their land.

Besides, the proposals sparked condemnation from international powers as well as some American Jewish groups.

The Israeli upcoming October 27 elections have brought the concept of Palestinian emigration from Gaza to the forefront of Israeli political narrative.

The once-taboo topic has become an increasingly popular position among right-wing politicians.

Several prominent politicians on the Israeli right, including some who currently hold key government positions, have raised the idea in recent weeks and pledged to advance it if they sit in the next coalition. Most starkly, ultra-nationalist Ben-Gvir unveiled a seven-year plan on September 3, to encourage Palestinians in Gaza“voluntarily” leave the coastal enclave.

“This is a free choice; we are not forcing anyone to leave, but there is encouragement for this,” Ben-Gvir said in a statement to the media after he announced his programme during a virtual press conference.

The American liberal pro-Israel group J Street was among those to condemn the proposal, saying:“It should horrify us to see a state, built in the aftermath of Jewish death and destruction, entertaining the ethnic cleansing of another people.”

The organisation urged people not to dismiss Ben-Gvir's plan as“fantasy or fringe,” adding,“This vision is now in the political mainstream, and that must be unequivocally rejected.”

Indeed, while few Israeli political observers expect such a plan to become government policy even if Israel continues to be ruled by a right-wing government, critics worry that the promotion of such measures throughout the election are already normalising the concept in Israeli society and harming Israel's international standing.

Under Ben-Gvir's proposal, a ministry would be established to oversee Palestinian displacement scheme. Incentives would be offered to Gazans who agreed to leave, and those countries that receive them would receive monetary benefits as well.

The programme has a target goal of 250,000 Gazans leaving in the first year of the programme and 1.86 million within seven years - nearly the entire 2.1 million population of the strip, Ben-Gvir said.

Although Ben-Gvir sits on the far right of the Israeli political map, a day earlier on September 2, the leader in prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu's mainstream Likud Party defense minister Israel Katz endorsed a plan for Palestinian relocation from the coastal strip as well.

"There is no real solution for Gaza in the end without this migration," Katz told a news conference.

The Israeli government "is organised and prepared to get them out, by sea, by air, by every way possible", he said.

Already in February 2025, Katz announced the establishment of an agency tasked with encouraging emigration from Gaza, and said that it was“fully prepared” for the moment when conditions would allow Israel to encourage Gazans to leave.

In a public interview Katz said that President Donald Trump had“frozen” the initiative under pressure from Arab countries.

Katz stressed, however, that the initiative had not been canceled and that discussions on the issue were ongoing.

In response to Katz's statement, Democratic Sennator Chris Van Hollen of Maryland called to end complicity with Israel's ethnic cleansing of Palestinians.”After our trip to the Gaza-Egypt border last year, Senator Jeff Merkle & I released a report entitled, 'The Netanyahu Government is Implementing a Plan to Ethnically Cleanse Gaza of Palestinians'. Now the Israeli Min of Defense confirmed that's the goal,” Van Hollen wrote on X.

Days later, US Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee told reporters that“nobody is suggesting that there will be forced displacement – the Israelis are not, the Americans are certainly not, I know of no one who supports that.”

Announcing a supposed ceasefire in October 2025, President Trump laid out 20 points for the territory that included no forced displacement.

Katz, known for his xenophobic and horrific remarks, said that Trump had only "frozen" the idea as he looks for countries to take in Palestinians.

"The plan hasn't been cancelled, it is being discussed all the time, even now, and I think there is no other solution for everyone's good," he said.

"But for it to happen, we need the US. When will we get their approval? Whenever it becomes clear that Hamas is not meeting its obligations" [under the ceasefire], he said.

Last June, Israel reportedly renamed its plan to encourage Palestinians to leave Gaza, dropping the term "voluntary migration" in favor of "Freedom of Movement Plan".

Israeli media said that Israeli security officials and the Mossad had been instructed to stop using the term“voluntary migration”, which had drawn sharp international criticism.

Israeli media reported at the time that the head of Israel's national security council, Shmuel Ben Ezra, had held an urgent meeting on encouraging Palestinians to leave Gaza. According to news reports, Mossad officials admitted they had so far failed to find any country willing to accept displaced Palestinians.

Forced displacement of civilians in occupied territory is considered a war crime under the Geneva Conventions.

The International Criminal Court ( ICC ) has issued arrest warrants for Netanyahu and Katz's predecessor Yoav Gallant over war crimes.

Israeli attacks have already internally displaced the vast majority of Gaza's people since October 2023.

Israel's war has since killed 73,470 Palestinians in Gaza, with more than 1,400 since the alleged ceasefire.

In their joint statement, the Arab and Islamic foreign ministers stressed that the Gaza Strip is an integral part of the Occupied Palestinian Territory and underscored the imperative of preserving the unity of the Palestinian territory in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem.

They reaffirmed that the only path towards achieving a just and lasting peace lies in the implementation of the two-state solution with the establishment of an independent Palestinian State along the lines of June 4, 1967, with East Jerusalem as its capital, in accordance with the relevant resolutions of international legitimacy.

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