ON Sunday, the Washington Post paper reported details of a 38-page ‘prospectus’ that is circulating ‘within the Trump administration’ laying out plans to ‘take over Gaza’ and own it.
When Trump first made this desire public back in February, along with his ‘vision’ of turning the Gaza Strip into the ‘Riviera of the Middle East’, it was widely dismissed as typical deluded ravings from the US president.
Deluded Trump may be, but this plan to take over Gaza and place it under the control of US imperialism is far from being just another raving.
Behind the scenes, this plan has been worked on since April, according to the Post.
Called the Gaza Reconstitution, Economic Acceleration and Transformation Trust, or the Great Trust, the plan proposes that over two million Palestinians living in Gaza should be removed from the Strip, either in what it calls ‘voluntary’ departures to other countries, or forcibly moved to ‘restricted, secure zones’ while reconstruction takes place.
Palestinians who own land would be offered a ‘digital token’ by the trust in exchange for the right of the multi-international property developers to take over.
This will not cost these private ‘developers’ much as they contemptuously claim that 80% of the Gaza Strip belongs to no individual Palestinian so can be taken over for free.
The Post reported: ‘Calculations included in the plan envision a nearly fourfold return on a $100 billion investment after 10 years, with ongoing “self-generating” revenue streams.’
With the entire Palestinian population either driven out, confined to virtual concentration camps located outside Gaza, or murdered by Israeli military strikes, the US-backed Great Trust promises to erect six to eight ‘dynamic modern and AI-powered smart planned cities’ complete with golf courses and multi-storey glass apartments.
This plan, drawn up in April by the Boston Consulting Group – which was behind the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) and notorious for running ‘aid’ centres that are killing grounds for starving Palestinians – will be responsible for running the camps for displaced Palestinians.
The beauty of this plan for the US is that it does not involve funding by the US government; instead, the whole plan would be funded by joint public and private sector investments.
This new US real estate in Gaza would be policed by third-country nationals and ‘Western’ private military contractors (mercenaries) while Israel would have ‘overarching rights to meet its security needs’.
Along with providing many billions in profit for US real-estate and financial companies, this plan offers the great prize of establishing in Gaza an area under the complete military domination of US imperialism from which it can attempt to assert US domination over the entire Middle East region and its wealth.
These plans were under consideration at the meeting last Wednesday between Trump, his Middle East advisor Steve Witkoff, and ex-Labour prime minister and arch war criminal Tony Blair.
The fact that these plans have for months been carefully constructed completely shatters any illusion that protest alone can bring about an end to imperialist-backed Zionist genocide being carried out in the interests of the US and its imperialist allies in the UK and the world.
The working class internationally has the power and strength to end the genocide being carried out by the Zionist regime, made possible by the complicity and support of the capitalist governments, by calling general strikes to bring down these governments, replacing them with workers’ governments and socialism.
The working class in the UK must lead the way by forcing the TUC to call a general strike to bring down the Starmer government and bring in a workers’ government that will end all complicity with Zionist genocide, recognise the State of Palestine and provide all the support it requires to establish a Palestinian Workers State.
Join the Young Socialists lobby of the TUC Annual Congress meeting on Sunday 7th September to demand the TUC call an immediate general strike.
This is the way forward.
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