By Ya Libnan Editoria Board , OpEd
For Gazans, Gaza is home.
For Hamas, Gaza became the price paid for Iranian patronage.
For Jared Kushner, Gaza is real estate.
This brutal contrast captures the moral collapse surrounding Gaza’s destruction.
According to a report by The Wall Street Journal, the Trump administration is quietly circulating a sweeping and deeply controversial proposal to rebuild Gaza into a futuristic international hub. Dubbed “Project Sunrise,” the plan envisions luxury beachfront resorts, AI-powered infrastructure, and high-speed rail—while remaining conspicuously silent on the fate of Gaza’s people.
This is not reconstruction. It is erasure.
For Palestinians, Gaza is not an empty coastline waiting for developers. It is home—however battered, however besieged. Yet for Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law and chief Middle East dealmaker, Gaza has long been framed less as a human tragedy than as a “prime piece of waterfront real estate.” Development talk replaces accountability; luxury replaces justice.
Earlier this year, Donald Trump openly floated the idea of pushing Gazans into Egypt or other Arab countries—language that echoes ethnic cleansing more than diplomacy. Forced displacement is now being repackaged as “relocation,” and dispossession as “urban renewal.”
Meanwhile, Hamas bears its own historic responsibility. By subordinating Gaza’s future to Iran’s regional ambitions, Hamas effectively gambled with the lives of two million civilians. Gaza became collateral—its people the currency exchanged for weapons, funding, and political relevance.
What is most chilling, however, is what may come next.
After 34 years of separation from Somalia, Somaliland—with a population of roughly six million—was reportedly recognized today by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. In regional political circles, analysts are already whispering about a darker possibility: that Somaliland could be positioned as a future dumping ground for displaced Gazans.
If true, this would mark one of the most cruel acts of the modern era—the forced uprooting of a people from their land, not because there is no alternative, but because powerful actors find displacement more convenient than justice.
History will not remember the architectural renderings or the AI slogans. It will remember whether the world stood silent while a population was removed to make way for beachfront visions and geopolitical deals.
Gaza is not a development project.
It is not a bargaining chip.
And it is certainly not for sale.
Justice begins with one non-negotiable truth: the people of Gaza belong in Gaza.