Map depicting the Gaza Strip and West Bank, regions at the center of the ongoing Middle East crisis. A shocking plan to ‘cleanse’ Gaza of its more than two million occupanats and transform it into the ‘Riviera of the Middle East’ may yet come to pass, warns columnist Gwynne Dyer. Wikipedia Screenshot Photo by Cameron Kilfoy /Cameron KilfoyArticle contentA motley band of greedy fantasists got together at the White House on Aug. 27 and came up with a cunning plan to bring peace to the Middle East while lining their own pockets at the same time.THIS CONTENT IS RESERVED FOR SUBSCRIBERS ONLY.Subscribe now to access this story and more:Unlimited access to the website and appExclusive access to premium content, newsletters and podcastsFull access to the e-Edition app, an electronic replica of the print edition that you can share, download and comment onEnjoy insights and behind-the-scenes analysis from our award-winning journalistsSupport local journalists and the next generation of journalistsSUBSCRIBE TO UNLOCK MORE ARTICLES.Subscribe or sign in to your account to continue your reading experience.Unlimited access to the website and appExclusive access to premium content, newsletters and podcastsFull access to the e-Edition app, an electronic replica of the print edition that you can share, download and comment onEnjoy insights and behind-the-scenes analysis from our award-winning journalistsSupport local journalists and the next generation of journalistsRegister to unlock more articles.Create an account or sign in to continue your reading experience.Access additional stories every monthShare your thoughts and join the conversation in our commenting communityGet email updates from your favourite authorsSign In or Create an AccountorArticle contentArticle contentArticle contentIt was ‘leaked’ within days, as it was clearly meant to be, and since then the sound of outraged clucking has been loud in the land.Article contentArticle contentIt is “a Trumpian get-rich-quick scheme reliant on war crimes, AI and tourism,” wrote the Israeli daily Ha’aretz.Article contentArticle contentArticle content“It’s a textbook case of international crimes on an unimaginable scale: forcible population transfer, demographic engineering and collective punishment,” said Duncan Grant, head of Swiss-based human rights group Trial International.Article contentArticle content“It’s insane,” said H.A. Hellyer of the Royal United Services Institute. They are right, so far as they go – but they only know the half of it. The other half is that this is an insane crime that could actually happen.Article contentArticle content‘RIVIERA OF THE MIDDLE EAST’Article contentArticle contentAs you would expect at a meeting chaired by United States President Donald Trump, half the participants were real estate developers by trade – himself, his ignorant ‘Special Envoy for the Middle East’ Steve Witkoff, and his son-in-law Jared Kushner. Marco Rubio was there as National Security Adviser, and former British prime minister Tony Blair to raise the tone a bit.Article contentArticle contentArticle contentBlair can’t raise it all that much, because he is a war criminal himself. (He has admitted that he would have invaded Iraq even if he had known that there were no ‘weapons of mass destruction’ there.)Article contentArticle contentBut he and his Tony Blair Institute (TBI) have spent the past nine years scrounging money from various Middle Eastern potentates and investors, so he has contacts.Article contentArticle contentThe meeting was intended to flesh out the plan for ‘cleansing’ Gaza of its two million current residents that Trump first mooted early this year and replacing them with an unspecified but wealthy ‘international’ population who would turn it into ‘the Riviera of the Middle East.’ You know, like Saint-Tropez, Antibes and the Cinque Terre, only flatter and farther east.Article contentArticle contentThe Palestinians who are living and dying in Gaza now would be ‘relocated’ to some other country while 40 million tonnes of rubble, unexploded ordnance and decomposed bodies are cleared away and a shiny new city is built on the ruins. Property owners will be given digital tokens that they can spend to resettle elsewhere or maybe even buy property in Gaza again.
GWYNNE DYER: Gaza not so much a genocide
