
The 47th president of the United States, Donald Trump, may go down in history as one of the consequential presidents of the country. The US president – an able and a gifted man - blends showmanship, shrewd business sense and astute political acumen with a ‘chaos theory, disruptive approach to politics’ - within and without.
The genius of his approach lies in its effects and consequences: he, for one, has the rapt attention of the entire world. (This is not mere lip service and facile attention; it is real).
In the latest burst of provocative acts, Trump has displayed an AI generated image of Gaza transformed into a Riviera (like Dubai). It is a follow up to Trump’s assertion that Gazans be transferred to Jordan and Egypt and Gaza redeveloped.
On the face of it this is an ‘in your face provocation’ that turns inside out and up and down the history, politics, memory and mocks at the displacement of Palestinians. But the question is: Does Trump mean it?
We can never be sure. But we can only speculate. To arrive at a ‘reasonable speculative conclusion’, a wee backdrop to the politics of the Middle East and the nature of the conflict between Israel and Palestine is called for.
Issue of Palestine
The ‘issue of Palestine’ stems from wrongs committed to peoples - Palestinians in historic Palestine and Jew in Europe. Pioneered by Theodore Herzl - a playwright and a writer - whose ‘inner conflict’ is European Jewry, and their treatment was heightened and reached its apogee with the Dreyfus affair in France, a political movement called Zionism was created.
It reached its defining moment in the sordid saga of the Holocaust (called Shoah in Hebrew). While Zionism was defined by internal contradiction and dissensus. The major Faultline was that whether Jews primary focus of attention and existential quotient should be the Torah or territorial nationalism.
The corollary to this was whether exile was the desirable condition of Jews or whether it lay within the confines of a nation state (or state nation). While this argument is not entirely settled till this day, but the State of Israel was established in 1948 at the expense of Palestinians, their displacement and dispossession.
This could not have happened without the collision of some major western states. The Balfour Declaration - a document that sealed the fate of Palestinians - springs to mind here. Post the creation of Israel, the United States became the country’s major ally and backer. Other western states followed.
Trump’s Latest Bomb Shell
The Palestinian cause - a rallying and mobilizing cry- for the Arab world- morphed into a nationalist resistance (which then gradually evolved into an idiom of Islamo-nationalism). In the meantime, Palestine and Palestinians were invisibilized in the politics of the broader Arab world. Thus, was borne the Palestinian tragedy.
In terms of the resolution of the dispute, ending of Israeli occupation and allied issues, a certain stasis- predictable - defined it. This was emblematized by the two-state solution that was touted as a potential resolution of the issue, repeated ad nauseum, but its import was mostly rhetorical - that is, lip service was paid to it.
This is a very brief and reductive delineation of the whole saga. But it can serve as a starting point or even a point of departure for assessing Trump’s latest bomb shell. What is Trump aiming to achieve?
Taken on face value, if the real agenda of the US president is to turn Gaza into Riviera as the AI image and his preceding statements suggest, then this would amount to historical, ideational, ideological and memory erasure of Palestine and Palestinians.
Erasure of Palestinians & History
In one fell swoop, an entire people’s identity, history, struggles are erased and effaced. If this happens, will this ‘conflict transformation’ amount to ‘conflict resolution’? No. It shores up the conflict and issue.
Given the significance of the issue, it will have regional and global ramifications- if not now but surely at some future point in time. But Trump is a smart and an astute man. If there is one central idea or theme that defines both his election campaign and presidency, it is that people matter (in his scheme of MAGA, American people are at the centre).
A somewhat close analogue would be Trump’s anathema toward globalism and reducing America’s issues and problems to that. But globalism at its heart was precisely the ideological - political-economic paradigm that Trump’s Riviera idea for Gaza emblematizes. If people, their identity and broadly the vox matter, why is Trump insisting on his provocation?
Again, we can only speculate. From a sanguine point of view, Trump’s provocation may be designed to throw a spanner into the politics of the Middle East and the stasis that has historically defined Palestine and Israel.
Gaza as Riviera envisioned by Trump
The corollary may be designed to make Arab leaders go into a huddle and do something real and substantial in terms of Palestine. The AI image of Gaza turned into Riviera as a follow up to his earlier statements may then in the nature of a ‘Psy -Op’. If it is this, it surely is in bad taste.
To conclude on a personal note, I have been following Trump and his politics since 2015. I have turned from a critic to a kind of an admirer. The central theme and idea about his politics that can be culled from his approach, style is that people matter. Fairness is important.
The corollary is that policies must not be designed and executed over the heads of people. A sub theme of these is that identity is important and matters and so on. If these central ideas define Trump - the man, the business tycoon, the politician, the insurgent out to disrupt staid anti-people politics and the president, it is perplexing why he should graft it into another people.
Another major theme that defines Trump - the person and the president - is his emphasis on common sense. A basic perusal of his speeches, policy memos and statements bear this emphasis on common sense out. But the Riviera idea defies and falls flat on common sense.
At the risk of tautology, it is this common sense blended with fairness that Trump must employ vis-a-vis Palestine and Palestinians, not grandiose ideas.
Have you liked the news article?