Live updates: Follow the latest on Israel-Gaza
President Donald Trump wants the US to take an "ownership position" of the Gaza Strip and has again declared that Egypt and Jordan, as well as other countries, must accommodate all of the Palestinians living in the war-ravaged territory so America can develop it into a "Riviera of the Middle East".
The astounding remarks turn decades of US policy on Israel and Palestine on their head and, if implemented, would appear to sound the death knell for any hope for a two-state solution.
Mr Trump's plans might sound far-fetched but he said he is prepared to send US troops into Gaza "if it's necessary" and in his second term he has repeated a desire for the US to gain control of sovereign territory, including Greenland and the Panama Canal.
Here is a look at Mr Trump's historic proposal for the Middle East:
What has Trump said?
At a news conference alongside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the White House on Tuesday, Mr Trump outlined his extraordinary proposal for the Gaza Strip.
"We'll own it and be responsible for dismantling all of the dangerous unexploded bombs and other weapons on the site, level the site, and get rid of the destroyed buildings, level it out, create an economic development that will supply unlimited numbers of jobs and housing for the people of the area," Mr Trump said. "And we will do a good job with it, too."
He suggested America's "ownership position" over Gaza would be long term. He said he is prepared to send US troops to the Palestinian territory to secure any security vacuum.
"If it's necessary, we'll do that," Mr Trump said. "We're going to take over that piece, and we're going to develop it, create thousands and thousands of jobs, and it'll be something that the entire Middle East can be very proud of."
Since assuming office on January 20, Mr Trump has repeatedly floated the idea that Jordan and Egypt will accept the relocation of the entire population of the Gaza Strip. He went further on Tuesday, saying that Gaza is essentially no longer a viable Palestinian enclave, as far as he was concerned.
“Look, the Gaza thing has not worked. It's never worked. And I feel very differently about Gaza than a lot of people,” Mr Trump said. “I think they should get a good, fresh, beautiful piece of land. We get some people to put up the money to build it and make it nice and make it habitable and enjoyable.”
Mr Trump used two of his top advisers – Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff and National Security Adviser Mike Waltz – to emphasise his message that Gaza is uninhabitable.
“There's 30,000 unexploded munitions. There's buildings that could tip over at any moment. There's no utilities there whatsoever, no working water, electric, gas, nothing. God knows what kind of disease might be festering there,” Mr Witkoff, who visited Gaza last week, told reporters. “So when the President talks about cleaning it out, he talks about making it habitable.”
Mr Trump said the population of Gaza needing to be resettled is between about 1.7 and 1.8 million people. Pre-war estimates put the population at about 2.2 million people. The reason for the discrepancy was not clear. Local authorities in Gaza say more than 47,400 people have been killed there since the war started after the Hamas-led October 7, 2023 attack on Israel killed 1,200.
“I think they'll be resettled in areas where they can live a beautiful life and not be worried about dying every day,” Mr Trump said.
What do Egypt and Jordan say?
Both Amman and Cairo have completely rejected Mr Trump's proposal. And the foreign ministers of the UAE, Jordan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Qatar, and Palestinian presidential adviser Hussein Al Sheikh, wrote a letter to US Secretary of State Marco Rubio this week opposing plans to displace Palestinians from Gaza.
“Reconstruction in Gaza should be through direct engagement with and participation of the people of Gaza. Palestinians will live in their land and help rebuild it,” the letter said. “And they should not be stripped of their agency during reconstruction as they must take ownership of the process with the support of the international community.”
After Mr Trump's comments on Tuesday, Riyad Mansour, the Palestinian ambassador to the UN, said Palestinians must have the right to rebuild their homes in Gaza.
“They want to rebuild the schools, the hospitals, the roads, the infrastructures and the buildings and homes, because this is where they belong,” he said.
The Saudi government, in a statement, stressed its rejection of any attempt to displace Palestinians from their land and said it would not establish relations with Israel without establishment of a Palestinian state.
Nonetheless, Mr Trump insists Jordan and Egypt will accept displaced Palestinians.
“They say they’re not going to accept – I say they will,” Mr Trump said, pointing to Venezuela, which recently agreed to take back deportees from the US after refusing for a year.
Without going into detail, he also suggested other, “really rich” nations, would be willing to supply land, and several areas could be built to permanently house Palestinians “where they can live a beautiful life.”
"I can tell you, I spoke to other leaders of countries in the Middle East, and they love the idea. They say it would really bring stability," Mr Trump said.
He said Gaza would be rebuilt but did not elaborate on who should live there or who would control it. When asked if Palestinians could ever return to Gaza, he said: “Why would they want to return? That place has been hell.”
Is forced displacement a war crime?
Article 49 of the 1949 Geneva Conventions, which dictate how people should be treated during conflict, states that “Individual or mass forcible transfers, as well as deportations of protected persons from occupied territory to the territory of the occupying power or to that of any other country, occupied or not, are prohibited, regardless of their motive.”
But Mr Trump may be betting he can persuade the world that displacing Gazans is in their own humanitarian interest given their ancestral homeland is in ruins.
He might also be looking at the significant aid the US gives Amman and Cairo as a bargaining chip to accept displaced Palestinians. Hard-line right-wing members of Mr Netanyahu’s government have embraced the call to move displaced Palestinians out of Gaza.
“To me, it is unfair to explain to Palestinians that they might be back in five years,” Mr Witkoff, the Middle East envoy, told reporters. “That’s just preposterous.”
What is blockchain?
Blockchain is a form of distributed ledger technology, a digital system in which data is recorded across multiple places at the same time. Unlike traditional databases, DLTs have no central administrator or centralised data storage. They are transparent because the data is visible and, because they are automatically replicated and impossible to be tampered with, they are secure.
The main difference between blockchain and other forms of DLT is the way data is stored as ‘blocks’ – new transactions are added to the existing ‘chain’ of past transactions, hence the name ‘blockchain’. It is impossible to delete or modify information on the chain due to the replication of blocks across various locations.
Blockchain is mostly associated with cryptocurrency Bitcoin. Due to the inability to tamper with transactions, advocates say this makes the currency more secure and safer than traditional systems. It is maintained by a network of people referred to as ‘miners’, who receive rewards for solving complex mathematical equations that enable transactions to go through.
However, one of the major problems that has come to light has been the presence of illicit material buried in the Bitcoin blockchain, linking it to the dark web.
Other blockchain platforms can offer things like smart contracts, which are automatically implemented when specific conditions from all interested parties are reached, cutting the time involved and the risk of mistakes. Another use could be storing medical records, as patients can be confident their information cannot be changed. The technology can also be used in supply chains, voting and has the potential to used for storing property records.
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South Africa v India schedule
Tests: 1st Test Jan 5-9, Cape Town; 2nd Test Jan 13-17, Centurion; 3rd Test Jan 24-28, Johannesburg
ODIs: 1st ODI Feb 1, Durban; 2nd ODI Feb 4, Centurion; 3rd ODI Feb 7, Cape Town; 4th ODI Feb 10, Johannesburg; 5th ODI Feb 13, Port Elizabeth; 6th ODI Feb 16, Centurion
T20Is: 1st T20I Feb 18, Johannesburg; 2nd T20I Feb 21, Centurion; 3rd T20I Feb 24, Cape Town
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GP3 qualifying, 10:15am
Formula 2, practice 11:30am
Formula 1, first practice, 1pm
GP3 qualifying session, 3.10pm
Formula 1 second practice, 5pm
Formula 2 qualifying, 7pm
Bharat
Director: Ali Abbas Zafar
Starring: Salman Khan, Katrina Kaif, Sunil Grover
Rating: 2.5 out of 5 stars
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
The specs
Engine: 4.0-litre, twin-turbocharged V8
Transmission: nine-speed automatic
Power: 630bhp
Torque: 900Nm
Price: Dh810,000
Abu Dhabi race card
5pm Abu Dhabi Fillies Classic Prestige | Dh110,000 | 1,400m
5.30pm Abu Dhabi Colts Classic Prestige | Dh110,000 | 1,400m
6pm Abu Dhabi Championship Listed | Dh180,000 | 1,600m
6.30pm Maiden | Dh80,000 | 1,600m
7pm Wathba Stallions Cup Handicap | Dh80,000 | 1,400m
7.30pm Handicap (TB) |Dh100,000 | 2,400m
THE SPECS
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Transmission: eight-speed automatic
Power: 258hp at 5,000-6,500rpm
Torque: 400Nm from 1,550-4,400rpm
Fuel economy, combined: 6.4L/100km
Price, base: from D215,000 (Dh230,000 as tested)
On sale: now
BUNDESLIGA FIXTURES
Friday (UAE kick-off times)
Cologne v Hoffenheim (11.30pm)
Saturday
Hertha Berlin v RB Leipzig (6.30pm)
Schalke v Fortuna Dusseldof (6.30pm)
Mainz v Union Berlin (6.30pm)
Paderborn v Augsburg (6.30pm)
Bayern Munich v Borussia Dortmund (9.30pm)
Sunday
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Wolfsburg v Bayer Leverkusen (6.30pm)
SC Freiburg v Eintracht Frankfurt (9on)
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- Power: 640hp
- Torque: 760nm
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- Price: Not announced yet
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Champions League quarter-final, first leg
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Match on BeIN Sports
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Transmission: 10-speed auto
Fuel consumption: 11.7L/100km
On sale: Now
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Benefits of first-time home buyers' scheme
- Priority access to new homes from participating developers
- Discounts on sales price of off-plan units
- Flexible payment plans from developers
- Mortgages with better interest rates, faster approval times and reduced fees
- DLD registration fee can be paid through banks or credit cards at zero interest rates
Vaccine Progress in the Middle East
At Everton Appearances: 77; Goals: 17
At Manchester United Appearances: 559; Goals: 253
GAC GS8 Specs
Engine: 2.0-litre 4cyl turbo
Power: 248hp at 5,200rpm
Torque: 400Nm at 1,750-4,000rpm
Transmission: 8-speed auto
Fuel consumption: 9.1L/100km
On sale: Now
Price: From Dh149,900
Specs
Engine: Electric motor generating 54.2kWh (Cooper SE and Aceman SE), 64.6kW (Countryman All4 SE)
Power: 218hp (Cooper and Aceman), 313hp (Countryman)
Torque: 330Nm (Cooper and Aceman), 494Nm (Countryman)
On sale: Now
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UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
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Starring: Josh Hartnett, Saleka Shyamalan, Ariel Donaghue
Director: M Night Shyamalan
Rating: 3/5
Tearful appearance
Chancellor Rachel Reeves set markets on edge as she appeared visibly distraught in parliament on Wednesday.
Legislative setbacks for the government have blown a new hole in the budgetary calculations at a time when the deficit is stubbornly large and the economy is struggling to grow.
She appeared with Keir Starmer on Thursday and the pair embraced, but he had failed to give her his backing as she cried a day earlier.
A spokesman said her upset demeanour was due to a personal matter.
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Uefa Champions League final:
Who: Real Madrid v Liverpool
Where: NSC Olimpiyskiy Stadium, Kiev, Ukraine
When: Saturday, May 26, 10.45pm (UAE)
TV: Match on BeIN Sports
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VERSTAPPEN'S FIRSTS
Youngest F1 driver (17 years 3 days Japan 2014)
Youngest driver to start an F1 race (17 years 166 days – Australia 2015)
Youngest F1 driver to score points (17 years 180 days - Malaysia 2015)
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Youngest F1 winner (18 years 228 days – Spain 2016)
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Founders: Abdulmajeed Alsukhan, Turki Bin Zarah and Abdulmohsen Albabtain.
Based: Riyadh
Offices: UAE, Vietnam and Germany
Founded: September, 2020
Number of employees: 70
Sector: FinTech, online payment solutions
Funding to date: $116m in two funding rounds
Investors: Checkout.com, Impact46, Vision Ventures, Wealth Well, Seedra, Khwarizmi, Hala Ventures, Nama Ventures and family offices
