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It might already be too late to save the homes where many of the people of Gaza have been living and have memories of lives spent there. Or the recollections of people in Ramallah who spent their honeymoons in Gaza by the Mediterranean. Like many others, I too have strong and beautiful experiences of time spent in Gaza. Yet, at this time of almost unimaginable destruction of homes and lives, I turn my mind to the destruction of cultural heritage such as the Great Omari mosque, opened in the seventh century and also known as the Great Mosque of Gaza, whose minaret was partially destroyed and parts of its structure severely damaged. Or the historic Greek Orthodox Saint Porphyrius church, one of the oldest churches in the world, which narrowly escaped destruction for a second time after being struck by an Israeli missile that did not detonate. The fact that consideration is not given to their reconstruction only points to how readily it is accepted that Palestinians in Gaza are not a people who deserve to have their heritage preserved, but a pariah group who can be shunned with impunity.
Donald Trump’s announcement is a continuation of Benjamin Netanyahu’s policy of destroying the Gaza Strip pursued during the past 16 months. During Joe Biden’s term as president, the US supported Israel with arms and ammunition; now Trump is supporting it by proposing ethnic cleansing of its people. Without a country of their own, the Palestinians are deemed disposable and stateless, people who have no country and belong to no land, and have no memories and no attachments. If proof were needed of the Palestinians’ attachment to their land, the sight of tens of thousands of them returning to their destroyed homes in the north as soon as they were allowed without a moment’s hesitation, despite knowing that they were returning to devastation and ruin, should suffice. They were aware of Israel’s objective to forcibly remove them from the north and relocate them, and by their immediate return were collectively expressing their refusal to allow this to happen.
That all the crimes committed in Gaza should be wiped out, forgotten, left unpunished, as Trump envisages through his real estate deal for Gaza, is horrendous and too painful to consider. I am still reeling under the thought of the losses of my human rights and those of my colleagues in Gaza who lost their offices, files and homes. Years of hard work and documentation perishing under the rubble. It is also alarming that ethnic cleansing should be proposed so casually by the leader of one of the strongest countries in the world.
For Netanyahu, such an outcome would mean that all the crimes that his policies have led to would be wiped away with the destruction, forgiven and forgotten. That’s what he wants and that’s what he should never get. The fantasy that Palestinian refugees would be absorbed by the countries around them is not new. It was David Ben-Gurion in 1948 who predicted that in a generation or two the refugees would forget. They never did. Now many of the Palestinians from the areas that became Israel and who took refuge in Gaza are being threatened with expulsion.
Enforcement of Trump’s proposal looks unlikely. Yet, as long as Israel is in control of the borders of the Gaza Strip, and if the US does not lend its support to the third phase of the ceasefire when reconstruction is due to start, Israel can in effect stop any funding directed to reconstruction, as well as prevent the importation of material needed for reconstruction of the Strip from entering. This would leave the Palestinians living under intolerable conditions. It was the failure to reconstruct what was destroyed by Israeli bombardment in the 2014 war that led to future wars against the Strip.
The present war has not ended, but there is no mention yet of any negotiations for resolving the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians. I had some hope that after witnessing the gravity and extent of the destruction Israel has caused to its Palestinian neighbours, and the suffering that the Israeli hostages endured over the long period of their incarceration in Gaza, the people in Israel would be brought to their senses and there would be revulsion on both sides against the continuation of the ravages of war and military conflict. Yet this seems far fetched.
An international effort at reconstructing the Great Omari mosque and Saint Porphyrius church would indicate that the world is refusing Trump’s attempt at turning the fate of Palestinians in Gaza into a real estate project. A more humane approach than to transform Gaza into a Riviera would be a patient reconstruction of these two monuments of world heritage, as the start of rebuilding the devastated Strip. It would be a partial symbolic expiation for what was done to the people of Gaza and the world.
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Raja Shehadeh is a Palestinian lawyer and writer, and founder of the human rights organisation Al-Haq. He is the author of What Does Israel Fear From Palestine?
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