President Donald Trump has entered the White House with an ambitious international agenda. Whether it’s expanding the 2020 Abraham Accords between Israel and the Arab world, ending the three-year-long war in Ukraine or pushing Europe to spend more on its own defense, Trump isn’t wasting any time outlining his expectations. Some of them, like taking over Gaza and turning the territory into a U.S.-administered haven for the “world’s people,” are downright bonkers. Others, like higher European defense budgets, are far more conventional and increasingly recognized as urgent and necessary.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu believes there’s nothing wrong with letting Palestinians leave Gaza of their own free will. “The actual idea of allowing Gazans who want to leave to leave. I mean, what’s wrong with that? They can leave, they can then come back, they can relocate and come back. But you have to rebuild Gaza,” Netanyahu said in a Wednesday Sean Hannity interview on Fox News picked up by The Jerusalem Post. Defense Minister Israel Katz ordered the IDF on Thursday to prepare a plan for any Gazans...

Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz ordered his army to prepare a plan for the “voluntary departure” of residents from Gaza, following Trump’s proposal to unlawfully take over the Gaza Strip and ethnically cleanse the Palestinian enclave. Katz also falsely claimed countries which spoke out against Israel’s war crimes in Gaza, including Spain, Ireland and Norway, are “legally obligated to allow any Gaza resident to enter their territories.” Palestinians in Gaza have forcefully rejected any efforts to force them into exile.

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Israel defense minister tells army to prepare to relocate Palestinians from Gaza Israel's defense minister is telling the military to prepare to implement President Trump's plan to relocate Palestinians from Gaza. Defense Minister Israel Katz says the military should prepare exit options by land, sea and air so that anyone who wishes to can leave for "any country willing to accept them." Katz, however, is already getting pushback from one of the countries he called on to accept refugees. He says Spain, Norway, Ireland and other countries that have criticized...

Defense Minister Israel Katz said Thursday he welcomes President Donald Trump's proposal for large numbers of Palestinians to leave the Gaza Strip as he instructed the IDF to prepare a plan in line with the controversial plan. Katz said Trump's "bold plan" could "create extensive opportunities for those in Gaza who wish to leave." Trump’s plan initially stated that Gaza’s population would be "permanently" relocated while the United States rebuilds the territory, but U.S. officials later walked back those comments, saying the relocation would only be temporary. TRUMP'S PROPOSED US...

The White House on Wednesday tried to soften the most extreme elements of President Donald Trump’s declaration that he wanted to take ownership of Gaza, floating a more limited vision of U.S. involvement in the region. Press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters at the White House news briefing that Palestinians would be displaced temporarily rather than permanently, as Trump had said a day earlier. She said he had made no U.S. troop commitments despite his vow that the United States would dismantle bombs and clear out the territory. And she...

Nearly two million Palestinians in the Gaza Strip are leaving their refugee camps and crowded shelters to finally return home after the breakthrough cease-fire deal, only to find that their homes and neighborhoods are nothing but ash and rubble after 15-months of brutal warfare. The United Nations estimates that 69% of all buildings in Gaza have been damaged or destroyed, including more than 245,000 homes — with the World Bank estimating that the first four months alone caused $18.5 billion in damages. Researchers have compared say the scale of destruction...

Reuters reporter Jeff Mason asked White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt on Wednesday if she could clarify whether or not President Donald Trump’s position is to “permanently” or “temporarily” remove the population of Gaza. “Thanks very much. Two questions. One, the president yesterday used the word permanent for permanently resettle Palestinians. I hear you said temporarily today. Is that a shift or a specific change that you want to highlight? And my second question is, yesterday he spoke about the U.S. owning Gaza. Who owns Gaza now and how would...

As Palestinians trek back to their bombed-out homes in the Gaza Strip after 15 months of war between its ruling Hamas party and Israel, President Donald Trump's proposed to turn it into the "Riviera of the Middle East" on Tuesday. Standing next to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Trump proposed at a Tuesday night news conference to turn the enclave into an "international, unbelievable place" filled with "the world's people." The comments came less than a month after Israel and Hamas reached a deal to pause the 15-month war in...