By Sharon Zhang
Copyright truthout
Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich bragged about the possibility of a “real estate bonanza” on the ruins of Israel’s genocide in Gaza on Wednesday, saying that Israel is already in talks with the U.S. to divide up the land.
“The Gaza Strip is becoming a real estate bonanza,” Smotrich said in Hebrew at a real estate conference in Israel, per Israeli media.
Israel has “already begun negotiations with the Americans” on a “business plan” to make Gaza, home to 2.2 million Palestinians, into a real estate investment. The plan is on President Donald Trump’s desk, he claims.
He said that, because of these proposals, the genocide “pays for itself,” saying that Israel has “paid a lot of money” to wage its assault.
“We paid a lot of money for the war, so we need to decide how to divide the percentages of the land in Gaza. The demolition phase is always the first phase of urban renewal. We did that, now we need to start building,” he said, per Haaretz.
The U.S. has been considering a plan, called the Gaza Reconstitution, Economic Acceleration and Transformation Trust, or GREAT Trust, to relocate and potentially expel the entire population of Gaza to other countries. The proposal was first developed by a group of Israeli business people who came up with the proposal for the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF). Top U.S. consulting firm, Boston Consulting Group (BCG), provided financial modelling for the plan.
The plan calls for expelled Palestinians to be given a small fee for leaving, and for landowners to be given a “digital token” in exchange for redeveloping rights. This token could be used for relocation or “eventually redeemed for an apartment in one of six to eight new ‘AI-powered, smart cities’ to be built in Gaza,” the Washington Post reported this month.
The plan is in line with Trump’s rhetoric about making Gaza into the “Riviera” — a plan to build a beach resort for the rich on top of the ruins of Israel’s extermination campaign, on the former homes of Palestinians.
BCG calculated that the plan would be extremely lucrative financially, turning back four times its initial investment of $100 billion, according to the plan. The firm has distanced itself from the plan, saying that the partners who approved of the project have been fired.
Israeli and American officials have insisted that the relocation of Palestinians for the plan would be temporary, likely aware of international law banning the forced relocation of a population. However, Senators Chris Van Hollen (D-Maryland) and Jeff Merkley (D-Oregon) recently said in a report that that is a lie, and that it was clear from their visit to Israel and Palestine last month that Israel is preparing to expel the entire population of Palestinians from Gaza in an ethnic cleansing campaign.
“The fact that both the Netanyahu government and now the Trump Administration are framing their plan as a call for the ‘voluntary’ exodus of Palestinians from Gaza is one of the most fraudulent, sinister, and twisted cover stories ever told,” the report said.
