The plan of US President Donald Trump, which has provoked condemnatory reactions from the international community, to "take over" the Gaza Strip and resettle the Palestinians living there elsewhere, will threaten the already fragile truce in the enclave between Israel and the radical Palestinian group "Hamas" and will increase regional instability, Arab leaders said today, quoted by Reuters, writes BTA.
Arab League Secretary-General Ahmed Aboul Gheit warned from the podium at the World Government Summit in Dubai (UAE) that if Trump implements his plan, he will drag the Middle East into a new cycle of crises with a "destructive effect on peace and stability".
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said last night that he would end the ceasefire in Gaza if "Hamas" does not release Israeli hostages by noon on Saturday. The previous day, the Palestinian Islamist movement announced that it would stop releasing prisoners "until further notice" because Israeli shelling of the enclave had violated the ceasefire.
"If the situation explodes into military action once again, all efforts (for a ceasefire) will be in vain," said Aboul Gheit.
The Secretary-General of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), Jassem al-Budaywi, in turn, called on Trump to recall the strong ties between the region and Washington.
“But there must be reciprocity here - he speaks his mind and the Arab world must also speak its mind. What he says will not be accepted by the Arab world," said the head of the alliance.
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi also sees a security problem in Trump's plan, Reuters reports. He believes that Islamist groups such as "Hamas" are a significant threat to Egypt and its neighboring countries and would not accept members of the movement crossing the border and settling on Egyptian territory.
Egypt will host an extraordinary Arab summit on February 27, which is expected to discuss "serious developments" in the Palestinian issue.
Abul Ghait said that the idea of the Arab Peace Initiative, born in 2002, will be put on the agenda again. Arab countries offer Israel to normalize relations with them in exchange for an agreement for a Palestinian state and a complete withdrawal of Israeli troops from the territory occupied in 1967.
Trump's plan overturned decades of US policy, which supported a two-state solution to the conflict - Israel and Palestine, Reuters reports.