Who really cares about the Gazans?

There has been an outpouring of condemnation of President Trump’s plan to at least temporarily remove Palestinians from Gaza. In a full-page New York Times ad, 350 Jewish community leaders condemned his plan: Cody Edgerly noted “Our message to Palestinians is that you are not alone, our attention has not wavered, and we are committed to fighting with every breath we have to stop ethnic cleansing in Gaza.”

In the past, liberal governments actively supported ethnic movements after the ending of conflicts: Poles and Germans after WWII, Muslims and Hindus after India independence, and Greek and Turkish movements after WWI. Indeed, no one seemed to raise these claims, when in retaliation to Yassir Arafat support for the Iraqi invasion, Kuwait (now Qatar) expelled its 400,000 Palestinian residents.
However, what is most striking about the unequivocal condemnation is that there is little reference to the desire of the Gazans. After all, the alternative is to live in tents for years with the uncertainty of the rebuilding process and the likely political instability in Gaza being sustained.

When confronted with the issue of voluntary withdrawal, the apologist Peter Beinart claims: “For decades now, people in Gaza have been saying they would like to move, voluntarily, to the places from which they–or their parents or grandparents–were expelled.”

It is hard to believe his claim. First, Gazans are now three generations removed from the deplorable villages they lived in: mud huts, with no electricity, running water, or other modern infrastructure. Indeed, the Palestinian historian, Rashid Khalida noted that Gazans are now urbanized and have little desire to return to village life.
And probably a majority of Palestinian refugees from the coastal cities were recent migrants, seeking the employment opportunities that arose during the British mandate period. Many maintained their communal ties to their ancestral homes in the West Bank: marrying women from their villages and going back there to help during harvest times.

Beinart would have been better served if he took seriously the survey data provided by the top Palestinian polling agency, the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research. Its survey just prior to the IDF-Hamas War found, “A full 44% of Gazan youth between the ages of 18-29 were considering emigrating,” it reported. “Nearly a third (31%) of the entire population considered emigrating; the “most preferred destination for immigration is Turkey, followed by Germany, Canada, the United States, and Qatar.”

Seemingly contradicting this survey, a pro-Palestinian reporter countered:
But how do Palestinians in Gaza feel? Judging from the people I spoke to here, the answer is simple: Despite the immense hardships, the overwhelming majority of Gazans reject the idea of emigration—no matter what compensation or privileges may be offered, and even if the reconstruction of Gaza may take years.
One such person interviewed, 24-year-old Asma Abdu said,

I will never, ever leave my land. And those who left during the war to the south—they regret it deeply, … They returned home, even though they had no homes or shelters. … They didn’t think of the consequences. So how could you imagine they would accept permanent displacement?”

The rhetoric of Palestinian activists and the individuals they use to justify their position is often not representative of the broader populace. However, we should not be surprised. It is clear that today if Gazan families openly express an interest to leave they would be under substantial pressure to rescind that desire. Jerusalem Post reporter Itamar Marcus claims, “Gazans who choose to leave must be guaranteed secrecy and protection during the process.”

Putting political aspirations above the interest of the people has been a hallmark of Palestinian leadership. A classic example is the situation of the 400,000 Palestinian refugees in Lebanon. A comprehensive study reported:

The lack of access to jobs (and thus high youth unemployment), exclusion from owning property, the lack of access to quality education and the degraded situation in the camps were the most persistent specific structural factors highlighted by experts and refugees.

As a result, many Palestinians there seek emigration. Indeed, estimates suggest “between half to 80% of Palestinians in Lebanon have relatives abroad, primarily in Europe, a higher rate than for Palestinians in Jordan and Syria.”

Lebanese Palestinian emigration desires are stemmed by the same political factors facing Gazans: It would undermine their refugee status that is integral to the political interests of the activist community. But it is worse for the Lebanese. Unlike the situation in Jordan, they are unable to gain Lebanese citizenship even though they have lived there for three generations. This is why they suffer from apartheid-like discriminatory policies.

Pressure to conform to activists’ demands has been attempted in Israel and East Jerusalem. When the Israeli government instituted national service as an alternative to military serve for women, Palestinian nationalist undertook a concerting effort to pressure Muslim women not to enlist. This was successful for a few years but eventually many saw the benefits received by their Christian and Druze counterparts. Today, thousands of Muslim women enlist working on social projects in their communities.

In East Jerusalem, the Jordanian school curriculum used in West Bank schools continued to be used even after the 1967 War. This curriculum was insufficient to qualify for the Israeli college entrance requirements. When Muslim parents wished for the curriculum to be changed, they were strongly attacked by nationalists. Eventually, public schools changed their curriculum, opening the door into Israeli colleges for many. At the Hebrew University alone, 710 Arab students from East Jerusalem were enrolled in 2022, compared with only 36 five years earlier.

The refusal of European and Arab countries to absorb even temporarily Gazans makes any population transfer impossible. However, Trump’s proposal has been a catalyst for the Arab countries to, at long last, develop a day-after plan. In the next month, we will see if they are able to reach a consensus on a governing structure that excludes Hamas and a rebuilding plan that cannot be undermined by corruption or political disruption.

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Robert Cherry is an American Enterprise Institute affiliate and author of the forthcoming book Arab Citizens of Israel: How Far Have They Come? (Wicked Son’s, Fall 2025).