I have to say, on this one I hope he IS just bluffing.
Trump is ‘not bluffing’ on Gaza takeover, will do ‘what it takes,’ sources close to prez say
WASHINGTON — President Trump’s threat to take over the Gaza Strip is not a “bluff,” sources close to the White House told The Post Thursday.“The president is absolutely serious,” one White House official stressed.
The conversations have been in the works for months, meaning Trump was negotiating a solution for the Hamas-controlled land strip at war with Israel before his term began.
Steve Witkoff — Trump’s Middle East envoy — has played an influential part in the planning, a second source familiar with the internal discussions on the matter said, and White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed.
Witkoff developed his longtime friendship with Trump making billions in real estate investing and development in New York City. He traveled to Israel to meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the final days of the Biden administration, which the Trump administration says played a key part in securing a hostage release deal between Israel and Hamas.
“Absolutely” Trump would be willing to take US control of Gaza, the source said.
“If that’s what it takes. He’s also creating a sense of urgency to end the status quo. And if Gulf States don’t like his plan then they should come up with their own and take more ownership of the situation. But the fact is that the status quo is a disaster,” the source added.
It IS a disaster, has always BEEN a disaster, and, unless and until some Western leader somehow scrapes up the stones to say “enough already” and start in killing Paleosimian Mooselimbs in job lots, will always BE a disaster. In the wise words of Gen Curtis LeMay, albeit in a different context: “if you kill enough of them, they stop fighting.” Truer words were never spoken.
That said, no way can I see OMB’s proposal turning out to be anything but a YUUUUGE mistake and an enormous catastrophe for the US all around. All Trump really needs to do at this point is to just step back, keep his mouth shut, and let Netanyahu get on with the business at hand. The only thing Trump can conceivably accomplish by interjecting himself and his nation into “Palestine” will be to set the stage for an encoure of 1983’s Beirut Marine Barracks bombing, if not something even worse. I’m sure he means well, but this next bit underlines how hopelessly misguided Trump’s thinking is on this whole rotten deal.
Some Republicans have raised eyebrows at the possibility of getting entangled in a foreign conflict and putting American troops in harm’s way in the Middle East. Trump first said he would not rule out putting US boots on the ground, but then said, “no soldiers by the US would be needed.”
“The Gaza Strip would be turned over to the United States by Israel at the conclusion of fighting. The Palestinians, people like Chuck Schumer, would have already been resettled in far safer and more beautiful communities, with new and modern homes, in the region,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
“No soldiers by the US would be needed?” It is to laugh, sorry. By “in the region,” natch, Trump means Egypt, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia—all of whom have for decades now been steadfastly, flatly rejecting any notion of permitting those poor, put-upon Paleosimians to be “resettled” anywhere within their borders, in no uncertain terms. Which, y’know, they still are. Clearly, they and their fellow Arab Moslem nations want no part of them, haven’t the least intention of taking them in, and have never pussyfooted around about saying so, either.
Unless his plan involves a wing of A10 Thunderbolt IIs saturation-bombing the hellhole until not one brick is left standing on another, the best thing Trump can possibly offer is a shrug, a rueful smile, a palms-up hand gesture wordlessly expressing to one and all, “Hey, I tried, whatcha gonna do,” then a blanket endorsement for Netanyahu to finish the bloody job at long last. A final pertinent quote which spells out exactly what it is we’re dealing with here:
Judgement Day will not come until the Muslims fight the Jews. The Jews will hide behind the stones and the trees, and the stones and the trees will say, oh Muslim, oh servant of Allah, there is a Jew hiding behind me — come and kill him.
That, of course, is one of the more unpleasantly blood-curdling Hadiths culled from the Muzzrats’ hateful little murder-book, the subject of innumerable sermons in mosques scattered across the West, an uncompromisingly vicious mindset ubiquitous throughout not only “Palestine” but the Middle East entire. Which ought to tell any sentient being all he needs to know about this eternal conflict, and whence it really springs.
Just a bluff? A mere opening gambit to clear the decks for purposes of implementing a broader agenda, mayhap, to be cast aside with alacrity the instant its usefulness as a bargaining chip has expired? I pray that it is, but fear that it is not. If it isn’t, hopefully some trusted personage in Trump’s inner circle who has the Boss’s ear will step up and persuade the President that he needs to just quietly let this profoundly bad idea go by the wayside without further ado.
Update! A “pact with the devil,” John Hale calls the misbegotten ceasefire agreement with Hamas, and I couldn’t agree more.
THE world waited to see who would be the first three hostages Hamas released to Israel. Would they be alive, or already dead? Would they include the baby Kfir Bibas, whose second birthday was on Saturday, the day before the start of phase one of the ceasefire agreement and hostage/prisoner exchange?
Hamas are playing despicable and cruel mind games with the population of Israel in general, and the families of the hostages in particular – in how they release those poor abused souls who are still living, and the cold bodies of those they have murdered. And as the next six weeks of prolonged, drawn-out releases continue, the greater that psychological torture will be for the families still awaiting the release of their loved ones. It is expected that the living will be released first. My guess is that the Bibas family will be among the last, if not the last, hostages to be handed over.
The first hostages released were Emily Damari, Doron Steinbrecher and Romi Gonen, three young women who have spent a year and three months suffering in the dank, dark, suffocating terror tunnels beneath Gaza. Abused and assaulted, not knowing what their fate would be, clinging to life. Emily is British, yet the British government were barely interested in her plight as they were too concerned about appeasing the Muslim vote in the UK rather than being seen to support a Jew above the cause of the ‘Palestinian resistance’.
Hamas made a spectacle of the release. Heavily armed terrorists in full Hamas uniform kept the handover under control for the cameras while Palestinian civilians crowded in, shouting abuse and spitting at the young hostages.
After the six long weeks of phase one have elapsed, will there still be a ceasefire and further hostage releases possible, or will Hamas have violated the agreement forced on both Israel and Hamas by Donald Trump, eager to make a big impact on day one of his second presidency? Can a second phase be negotiated at all? There is much more work to be done before all hostages are released, and a permanent ceasefire attained.
The next phase of negotiations will take place during this phase one hostage release, where in exchange for 33 hostages of unknown status (dead or alive), Israel is to release nearly 2,000 terrorists and detainees, including more than 700 prisoners who between them are responsible for the murders of around 2,500 Israeli men, women and children.
In the meantime, rest assured that Hamas will keep pushing the boundaries of the current phase one agreement, flexing their propaganda muscles to keep their worldwide fan base enthused by their ‘resistance’. Just 12 hours before the ceasefire was supposed to begin, Hamas broke the terms of the agreement by not naming the first three hostages to be released. They did eventually give the names, well after the cut-off time, and after Benjamin Netanyahu halted the start of the agreement in response.
There are celebrations in Gaza and elsewhere, proclaiming this agreement as a victory for Hamas, and as a signal that murder and hostage-taking works and will be repeated. This deal is a pact with the Devil; any deal with Islamic terrorists is such. It encourages further terror, putting innocent people at risk worldwide – because this Islamic ‘struggle’ is for world domination, for a global Caliphate and the imposition of Islam and Sharia on every living soul.
Indeed so, right down the line. Again: I couldn’t agree more with Hale’s astute, clear-eyed evaluation of this patently raw deal.
- Entries
Trump doesn’t make mistakes. Watch, see, and learn.
It should be rather obvious that Trump has something most people lack, vision.
Of course he makes mistakes. As a human being, not God incarnate, mistakes are baked right into the cake.
Everyone makes mistakes.
But it matters what is meant by “takes over”.
Remember “Trump said…” isn’t always what Trump Said.
Well, yes he makes a mistake of no consequence occasionally. Some would call Sessions appointment a mistake. I don’t because it was impossible to know. What that is, is a learning experience*, born of making decisions in a virtual vacuum.
Trump has something in mind you haven’t considered. It’s always true. Almost Every time. And the rest of the time his words have been misconstrued, as Kenny points out. We see that often.
I don’t know of any mistakes Trump has made that I consider consequential that he had any choice in.
*yea, I know
I get all my news from Gutfeld, so what do I know, but here’s one way to read the tea leaves.
Trump is “talking past the sale”. Trump has no intention of putting American boots on the ground to fight Hamas. That would fracture his coalition beyond repair, and he has to know it.
The only way to “pacify” Gaza is to get rid of the Gazans, Hamas first. How to do that without fighting them?
Egypt and Jordan pay lip service to the Palestinian cause, but they sure as fuck don’t want any actual Palestinians living amongst them. Well, Trump has ways to win their hearts and minds. He can bring enough economic pain to topple their rickety regimes. He can sweeten the deal any number of ways, but just say, you have to take these murderous, welfare-queening jerks because we don’t want them.
If there’s anyone who can keep the lid on a bunch of radical Islamists, it’s a repressive Arab regime. Why, oh why, did we take out Saddam?
What percentage of Palestinians are willing to stay in Gaza no matter what? It can’t be all that many. Give them an out, and they might just go away. Then you drop enough bombs to collapse the tunnels and destroy all the mines and IED booby-traps. After that, you can build Paris on the Med. You get all the benefits of genocide without having to do it yourself.
Bibi Netanyahu was standing right there when Trump said all this crazy shit. He didn’t bat an eyelash. Make of that what you will.
“Why, oh why, did we take out Saddam?”
Overthrowing Qadaffi was also a big mistake.
I have no problem, none, with killing Saddam (or Q per H.s comment). It’s what else that POS W did that is the real problem.
Kill Saddam and get the hell out of the way. Let nature take it’s course with one provision – fuck with America and we WILL kill you.
I have one foreign policy initiative / aid – drop millions of cheap and reliable AR platform rifles to the masses, with enough ammo to overthrow any tyrant. Let the locals solve their own problems.
W didn’t take out Q.
0.and Crooked did. So they could run guns to Syria to try to take out Assad.
Q was a POS but he was now OUR POS as he was nominally cooperating on anti-Jihadism, had renounced terror and pursuit of WMDs. He had paid billions as restitution for Lockerbie and done whatever else was asked if him.
It was a Propaganda victory at the very least .
What 0 and Crooked did was get America s killed (Benghazi), make Libya a failed State and a terrorist hotbed and a Slave Market to boot. Meanwhile it furthered their aim to support Radical Jihadists over “Moderates” who at least cooperated with the US under W.
Yea, I know it wasn’t W that took out Q. Reagan tried and missed. I’m just saying I don’t care if we killed qadaffi. He deserved to die in as horrible a way as possible. That doesn’t excuse the criminal conduct of clinton and obama.
There are horrible people all over this world.
But taking him out was STUPID and HURT America.
That’s really all I care about. He would get his in hell sooner or later. Better for America had it been later.
Because now they’ve managed to take out Assad and THAT is also going to bite us in the ass and require Trump to fix it.
Between Reagan and 0 Qadaffi had a change of plans that was beneficial to America. One of the few good things W accomplished.
Q also made restitution in the billions to the victims of Lockerbie, another good thing, in order to show he meant it.
It made no sense taking him out.
The message sent was “Don’t make deals with America.”
I could care less waiting for hundreds of perp walks, till then fuck off
I’m in favor of this only if by “take over” he means raze it to the ground, dig it out to a depth of 100′, grade it, level it, and build a 20′ tall wall 20′ thick around the entire perimeter, and anytime anything larger than a rock is launched from within, we carpet bomb a grid square worth of living inhabitants.
When Gaza runs out of inhabitants (current estimates would place that point in about two years, based on historical precedent), the entirety of Gaza is ceded to Israel as recompense for decades of predations and for tolerating an entire region of terrorists in their midst.
You’ll notice that since Israel started leveling Gaza, the West Bank has been scrupulously well-behaved, by contrast.
There’s a lesson in there.
“he means raze it to the ground”
I think the Israeli’s have done pretty much that. Pics I’ve seen are devastation across the board.
Move the swine out, completely, to another place where they are under control, and the Mediterranean Seaside location could become a paradise, paid for by private investors. I think that is what the president has in mind. A once and for all end to the murderous pig problem in the ME. Take that off the table and Iran is left on it’s own, and will go down soon*.
*as I have predicted once Trump returned to the office. He will take Iran down
For 8+ years I’ve listened to people, some well meaning, many not, find fault with President Trump.
Anyone with even a whiff of history and understanding should see now just what Trump has faced. The entire federal government along with many of the states is a criminal enterprise. Not billions, no, it is trillions of dollars have been looted and used against conservatives in general and Trump in particular.
And yet here we are today, the most consequential two weeks since Fat Boy and Little Man were dropped on Japan, Trump is demolishing the deep state well beyond what anyone would have thought possible, and Trump still can’t catch a break. With everything else he has done, do you not think he deserves at least the respect that perhaps, maybe, just possibly he knows what he is doing even if it’s not your favorite thing? Trump has not committed men or material to Gaza, he is not responsible for the terror network living in that hellhole. The Israeli’s love Trump because he stood with them. They love him because he desires peace in the ME. And peace in the ME requires the destruction of the Iranian cabal, something the Israel’s understand clearly. Maybe some of you are just too damn short sighted to understand the big picture?
You outa sit back and watch, let the man do his job. No one else has ever risen to the challenge, so give him a break, lend him your support, quit bitching about perfection, stop helping the damn enemy within. You get one chance at this.
I remember you* told me voting was useless. I* told you it wasn’t.
I remember you told me only civil war could bring about change, I told you that it wasn’t time yet.
And here we are on the cusp of a victory that most of you could scarcely imagine. Take your win with grace and lend a hand.
*a general use of you and I, not directed at any single person