Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs (JCFA)

If anyone had any prior misgiving, U.S. President Donald Trump’s plan for the Gaza Strip has exposed one of the harshest realities: The lives of Gazans don’t matter to the fake “humanitarian” community unless they can be weaponized against the Jews and the Jewish state.

Before the October 7, 2023 massacre, according to UN statistics, every year, tens of thousands of truckloads of goods entered the Gaza Strip via Israel and Egypt, and there were hundreds of thousands of exits from Gaza into Israel and Egypt.

Nonetheless, the fake humanitarians accused Israel of imposing a “siege” on the Strip. They dubbed Gaza as the “biggest open-air prison in the world.” They complained about the insufficiency of the water and electricity Israel provided. They complained about the increasing unemployment, lack of opportunities, and lack of medical services. Seventy-five percent of the population in Gaza were “refugees” who received services from the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) and were entirely dependent on international aid. The situation in Gaza, if these fake humanitarians were to be believed, was nothing less than catastrophic.

Despite the siege, the Gazan terrorists never seemed to run out of the ammunition they used to shoot at Israeli soldiers or mortars and rockets that they frequently launched, indiscriminately targeting Israel’s civilian population. Despite the siege, the Gazans were able to build modern high-rise buildings and exclusive villa communities and were miraculously capable of importing heavy construction and engineering equipment that they used to dig hundreds of kilometers of terror tunnels.

While Gaza shares a border with Egypt, in the eyes of the fake humanitarians, Israel alone was always the villain and bore the sole responsibility for the dire situation.

Then came the October 7 massacre. Approximately six thousand¹ marauding genocidal terrorists invaded Israel and murdered almost 1,200 people. Many of the victims were raped and tortured, and some were beheaded. In addition, the terrorists took over 250 people hostage. As part of the attack, the genocidal terrorists fired thousands of rockets, destroyed nine out of the ten power lines carrying electricity into the Strip, and destroyed the land crossings.

While Israel was dragged into a war that it did not initiate or want, it quickly overcame the initial surprise and launched a counter-offensive.

Israeli forces fought in the most complex of urban environments and found and destroyed terror infrastructure in every corner. The terrorists hid themselves and their weaponry in schools, houses, buildings, children’s playgrounds, and even hospitals, above ground and below ground. The Israel Air Force attacked over 40,000 targets while tens of thousands of soldiers from the infantry, engineering, and armored corps operated on the ground.

After over a year of fighting, UN reports² claimed that 69 percent of all the buildings in Gaza had been destroyed or damaged, including 92 percent of the housing units. The Gazan population that once lived in the northern area of the strip was concentrated in humanitarian zones in the south. UN organizations bemoaned the dire situation daily. The situation was allegedly so bad that South Africa, operating at the behest of its Iranian sponsor, approached the International Court of Justice, claiming that Israel was committing nothing less than “genocide.” The Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court petitioned the court to issue arrest warrants against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and then-Minister of Defense Yoav Galant, claiming that Israel was implementing a policy of deliberate starvation as a means of war.

As a volatile ceasefire took hold, the UN estimated³ that it would take 21 years and over $1 billion just to remove the rubble in Gaza. In April 2024, the UN warned⁴ that clearing unexploded ordinance would take 14 years.

Then, Trump came along to shake up the otherwise deadlocked situation and presented a vision: Temporarily evacuate the Gazan population from the unbearable conditions in the destroyed Gaza Strip, allow the United States and other stakeholders to clear and rebuild Gaza, and turn it into the paradise it could and should be.

In any other circumstance, every UN organization, humanitarian, and state that cares about the Gazans would have immediately seized the opportunity to provide the impoverished and embattled Gazans with basic living conditions, healthcare, welfare, education, and more.

This, however, is not a regular situation. When the civil war broke out in Syria, the fleeing refugees made their way into Jordan, Turkey, and even Europe. When Russia invaded Ukraine, millions of Ukrainian refugees fled their homes and their homeland. All were received with open arms.

In stark contrast to any other war, and notwithstanding what was being depicted as an ever-worsening humanitarian disaster, the international community never seriously called on Egypt to open its doors to the fleeing Gazan refugees. The international community did not even blink when the Egyptians positioned tanks opposite Gaza’s southern border, threatening to kill anyone who dared to try and cross. The cross-border tunnels linking Egypt and Gaza, through which the genocidal terrorists armed themselves, were suddenly only operational in one direction. While foreign politicians paid worthless lip service and declared the willingness of their countries to accept a handful of refugees, in reality, the world was oblivious to the fact that the Gazans were trapped.

Following this obvious pattern, the fake humanitarians, the states that had until now declared their solidarity with the Gazans, and the entire UN mechanism competed with each other to see who could express the most outrageous condemnation of the Trump plan. For these charlatans, there could be no discussion whatsoever of offering the Gazans a future of hope. For these charlatans, the Gazans should be condemned to living in the rubble, with no electricity or water, and surrounded by unexploded ordinance. For these charlatans, Gazan children do not deserve an education. Suddenly, there is no “starvation.” Suddenly, there are sufficient medical facilities to provide for the needs of the Gazans.

The hypocrisy should fool no one. The fact of the matter is that the fake humanitarians, the states that allegedly care about the Gazans and the UN mechanisms, do not give a damn about the Gazans. Individually and cumulatively, all these actors truly despise the Gazans. They would be more than content to see them living in a demolition site, in squalor, without any essential services or amenities. Their only “concern” with the Gazans is that they continue to suffer so that they can be weaponized against Israel.

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