Congress presented with plan linking aid in Mideast with resettlement of Gazans

Eliyahu Tulshinski

December 8, 2023

As momentum builds for the resettlement of the population of Gaza, activists from the NGO Boneh Israel (literally: “Building Israel”) have presented congressmen with a plan to make U.S. foreign aid to Egypt, Iraq, Yemen, and Turkey contingent on those countries accepting a quota of refugees from Gaza. Recently, former US ambassador to the UN John Bolton and Dutch leader Geert Wilders called to resettle Gaza's population.

The plan's supporters say senior officials in both parties back the plan, though they are doing so quietly for now, as it would mark a reversal of 75 years of official U.S. policy. Till now, Arabs seeking to voluntarily resettle elsewhere are the only refugees not supported in their efforts. Both Hamas and Egypt are currently blocking Gazans from leaving physically, with the support of the U.N.

Support from Holland

Wilders, the victor in Holland's election last month, supports relocation of Arabs not just from Gaza, but from Judea and Samaria as well. He believes Jordan, with its historical connection to the Arabs of Judea and Samaria, having once ruled that area, to be the most logical choice for their resettlement.

Gazans, formerly ruled by Egypt but now claiming to be connected to the Arab population of Judea and Samaria, would be resettled in Jordan as well according to Wilders' plan.

Not necessarily Jordan

Jordan, however, is reluctant to accept any such refugees, having already fought a war against the PLO when the group attempted to overthrow King Hussein in 1970. The revolution was crushed and thousands of the group's members and sympathizers were expelled. Jordanian King Abdullah is averse to risking his monarchy, should they return.

Regional beneficiaries

Israel Hayom reports that the initiative being circulated on Capitol Hill identifies regional recipients of U.S. taxpayer money as the most logical destinations for Gazans. Specifically, Egypt, Turkey, Iraq and Yemen are the target states to absorb some two million Gazans. These nations were selected due to their location as well the fact each receives significant American aid:

A new initiative submitted to the US Congress calls for conditioning American aid to Arab countries on their willingness to receive refugees from Gaza, Israel Hayom has learned.

The proposal was shown to key figures in the House and Senate from both parties. Some who were privy to the details of the text have so far kept a low profile, saying that publicly coming out in favor of the program could derail it.

Less than 1%

The proponents of the strategy implore Congress to condition foreign aid to those nations on their acceptance of the resettlement plan, saying that part of their grants should be used to absorb Gazans. They calculated the number of Gazans each of those nations should accept so as to represent less than 1% of their population.

"Israel is trying to keep civilian casualties in the Gaza Strip as low as possible, but Hamas is not allowing the refugees to leave and Egypt is unwilling to open its borders," the plan's authors write in the opening paragraph. They later go on to explain that "the only moral solution is to ensure that Egypt opens its borders and allows for the refugees to flee from the tyrant control of Hamas. The US Government provides Egypt with approximately $1.3 billion in foreign aid, and these funds can be allocated to the refugees from Gaza who will be allowed into Egypt."

They continue: "The neighboring borders have been closed for too long, but it is now clear that in order to free the Gazan population from the tyrannical oppression of Hamas and to allow them to live free of war and bloodshed, Israel must encourage the international community to find the correct, moral and humane avenues for the relocation of the Gazan population."

For comparison, America now hosts a record 49.5 million foreign-born individuals, comprising 15% of the total population.

What would Biden say?

The advocates say that the proposal does not contradict that public statements of the Biden administration, since it encourages only voluntary migration:

It should be noted that the Biden administration opposes the forced removal of Gaza residents from the Strip but has not ruled out voluntary migration for those who choose to do so.

Arguing that Gazans should not be treated differently than refugees from other war zones, they conclude with a survey of recent resettlements:

This would not be the first time other countries accepted refugees. According to the UNHCR database, since the Russian invasion of Ukraine, for example, over 6 million Ukrainians have fled the country. Poland has accepted nearly 1.2 million Ukrainian refugees, Germany received almost 1 million and the Czech Republic close to half a million.

Likewise, since 2011 and the ongoing Syrian civil war, 6.7 million Syrians have fled Syria to be dispersed throughout the surrounding countries. 3.2 million Syrian refugees relocated to Turkey, 789,000 found refuge in Lebanon, 653,000 in Jordan, and 150,000 in Egypt while other Middle Eastern and European countries have accepted hundreds of thousands.

Check back for our coverage of past population transfers that led to peace and see our previous Middle East coverage: