UN chief warns against Gaza 'ethnic cleansing' after Trump comments

The UN chief warned Wednesday against ethnic cleansing in Gaza as he rejected US President Donald Trump's bombshell proposal for the United States to take control of the Palestinian territory and displace all its people.

Trump, in a White House news conference on Tuesday alongside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, stunningly proposed "long-term ownership" of Gaza by the United States, triggering an international uproar.

The remarks came after he has repeatedly called in recent days for the war-ravaged territory's residents to move to Jordan or Egypt.

"At its essence, the exercise of the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people is about the right of Palestinians to simply live as human beings in their own land," UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said in a speech to a UN committee that deals with the rights of Palestinians.

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But, he added, "we have seen the realization of those rights steadily slip farther out of reach."

"We have seen a chilling, systematic dehumanization and demonization of an entire people," Guterres said.

Guterres said nothing justified the October 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel that sparked the war in Gaza but "the catalogue of destruction and unspeakable horrors" that came as Israel attacked Gaza relentlessly in reprisal could not be justified either.

UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric, asked specifically about the Trump proposal, said "any forced displacement of people is tantamount to ethnic cleansing."

"It is vital that we stay true to the bedrock of international law. It is essential to avoid any form of ethnic cleansing."

After an international outcry, Trump administration officials tried Wednesday to walk back the Trump proposal, saying any displacement of the Palestinians of Gaza would be temporary while the largely destroyed territory is rebuilt.

Trump had also not committed to deploying US troops to carry out his plan, they said.

Guterres insisted on the idea of a two-state solution with Israel and the Palestinians living side by side in peace.

"Any durable peace will require tangible, irreversible and permanent progress toward the two-State solution, an end to the occupation, and the establishment of an independent Palestinian State, with Gaza as an integral part,' he said.

To that end, Palestinian envoy to the UN Riyad Mansour called for a "successful" international conference at the United Nations to discuss the issue, scheduled for June and co-chaired by Saudia Arabia and France.

Even with large parts of Gaza's north in ruins, hundreds of thousands of Palestinians have returned since late January, under a fragile truce that has halted more than 15 months of war.

Gaza's north, which includes Gaza City, has been devastated by Israel's military offensive launched after Hamas's 2023 attack, with homes, hospitals, schools and almost all civil infrastructure flattened.

Mansour reiterated Palestinians' rejection of Trump's plan to take over Gaza.

"We are not going to leave Gaza," he said. "It is part of our homeland, and we don't have a homeland other than the State of Palestine."

He added that Palestinians would be "delighted" to return to their homes in present-day Israel from where they were "kicked from."