Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs (JCFA)

• President Trump has recently raised the possibility of “relocating” Palestinians from Gaza to neighboring countries while the Gaza Strip is “cleaned up.”
• We tested two matched random groups of 255 Americans for their opinions on the plan. We also provided each group with an introduction that either was biased for the plan or against it.
• Prior to being presented with the plan, both groups were queried on their sympathy toward Israel, Hamas, and the Palestinians. Our results showed strong sympathy for Israel versus Hamas but more nuanced sympathy when asked about “Palestinians, but not Hamas” and sympathy for “both sides” equally.
• The group that received the biased pro-plan message showed a considerable uptick in agreement for the plan than did the group that received an anti-plan message.
• Results indicate that Trump’s plan potentially has substantial support in the United States and that messaging promoting it can bolster that support.

In a conversation with reporters on Air Force One on January 27, 2025, President Trump laid out a plan to “clean out” Gaza by moving out enough of the population to create a “clean slate.”¹ While Trump said that he had conversations with the leaders of both Egypt and Jordan, reactions in the Arab world to the plan are primarily negative, with Arab foreign ministers releasing a statement opposing the plan.²

Despite questions regarding whether the plan is realistic or not, Trump continues to promote it and has reiterated his intention to press local regional leaders to accept it.³

The plan differs from any previous plan by any American administration. Details regarding the plan have not been discussed or offered, and there is speculation whether or not it is intended as a permanent “relocation” or only a temporary resettlement till Gaza is physically rehabilitated. As far as Israel is concerned, there has been mostly official silence on the plan, although it is similar to proposals offered by Members of Israel’s Knesset Danny Danon and Ram Ben-Barak in November 2023.⁴

Present Study

Our intention was to gauge Americans’ reactions to the proposal and see if how it is framed would affect support for it. To do that, we independently selected two random groups, both representative of a balanced USA population, and presented them with the same questions regarding the plan, but with each group having a different introduction. One group received a “pro-plan” introduction, and the other an “anti-plan” introduction. Prior to presenting the introduction, we asked the following question to each group:

Who do you believe deserves more sympathy in the war between Israel and Hamas?

Choices were: Israel, Hamas, Palestinians – but not Hamas, Jews – but not Israelis, none of the parties deserve any sympathy, both parties deserve an equal amount of sympathy, and DK/unsure.

This question is the same as was asked in a previous study we conducted in December and June 2024 on a general, balanced sample of Americans. The present study was conducted between January 29-30, 2025, and has 255 subjects in each group (margin of error +-6%). The results here are as follows:

Group 1

Group 2:

Results show that the split in answers in both groups is the same, similar to the distributions we found in our previous studies. This means that each group shared baseline characteristics related to sentiment towards the parties in the conflict. Following this question, we presented the pro-plan introduction to one group and the anti-plan introduction to the other group, and then we presented our other questions. Since the baseline sentiment towards the parties in both groups was similar, any differences found in the pattern of answers to subsequent questions could reasonably be a function of the different introductions presented to each group. Both introductions were precisely 172 words.

Group 1, the pro-plan group, received the following introduction:

President Trump has presented a proposal to relocate Palestinians from Gaza to countries like Jordan and Egypt so that Gaza can be reconstructed without Hamas interference or attempts to reestablish terrorist infrastructure. Building for stability in Gaza will make a fresh start for the entire region, a respite for its citizens from repressive Hamas rule and its Jihadi indoctrination. Clearing out Gaza temporarily will help deradicalize its population by allowing regular citizens to live productive civilian lives in more stable nations. If executed with robust international support, relocation could provide displaced Palestinians with better living conditions, away from the terror-fueled violence to which they have been accustomed. It will also provide relief for the thousands of Israelis in small, marginalized desert communities who have lived under rocket fire, balloon, drone, and terror attacks since Hamas’s rise to power in 2007, which have stunted their development and interrupted their everyday lives. President Trump said the proposal would allow life without disruption and allow Gazans to live in safer and more comfortable areas.

Group 2, the anti-plan group, received this introduction:

President Trump has presented a proposal to relocate Palestinians from Gaza to Jordan and Egypt and previously floated sending them to Indonesia and Algeria, disregarding their indigenous rights. Trump’s proposal for ethnic cleansing violates international law by forcibly displacing Gazans from their homeland. Both Jordan and Egypt have rejected the plan, viewing it as a destabilizing security and economic burden. Palestinians oppose the proposal, claiming a right to remain in their land and fearing permanent displacement rather than a temporary move after months of displacement within Gaza, living in tents after Israel bombed and destroyed their homes and conducted genocide. Living under Israeli siege and brutal occupation in an open-air prison, Gazans are entirely controlled by Israel, a settler-colonialist entity guilty of war crimes. In addition, logistically, relocating more than a million people is impractical and ethically questionable, making housing and integration of a large population elsewhere unfeasible. The Trump plan’s aim is a Greater Israel ethnostate to erase Palestinian presence, identity, and rights, escalating rather than resolving regional conflicts.

Following the introduction, each group was asked the following questions:

1. President Trump has proposed that Gazans be resettled in neighboring countries. Do you:

Strongly agree / Disagree + I do not have enough information or understanding to make a decision

2. How important do you think the Gaza issue is for the United States?

Extremely important/Not at all important

3. Relocating Gaza civilians, per President Trump’s proposal, would lower the probability that they will turn to terror in the future.

Strongly agree / Disagree + I do not have enough information or understanding to make a decision

Results

Question 1

Group 1: pro-plan

Group2: anti-plan

Looking at the data, we see that in the pro-plan intro group, close to a third (32.2%) agreed with the Trump plan, while in the anti-plan intro group, about a quarter of the respondents (24.7%) agreed. In both groups, 37% (anti-plan) and 43% (pro-plan) either had no opinion or felt they did not have enough information to decide. Disagreement with the plan in the “pro” group was 25.5%, while in the “anti” group it was 46.2%. While formal statistical analysis did not show a significant statistical difference between the two groups, this is primarily due to sample size, as doubling our sample with the same pattern of results would have yielded a statistical analysis result indicating a very significant difference.

Question 2

Group 1: pro-plan

Group 2: anti-plan

Here, 82% of the pro-plan group felt that the Gaza issue was at least of some importance to the United States, while 75% of the anti-plan group felt that way. This difference is not as strong as the difference shown in the first question.

Question 3

Group 1: pro-plan

Group 2: anti-plan

Over 28% of the pro-plan group felt that the plan would help to reduce terror, while only 19% of the anti-plan group felt that way. As in the first question, the difference here appears to be meaningful. As in the first question, the difference here appears to be meaningful.

Discussion

As in our previous studies, sentiment towards Israel vs. Hamas vs. Palestinians shows strong favorable sentiment to Israel when compared with Hamas, but less so when compared with the more generic and non-terror-tainted term “Palestinians.” We again see a strong “both sides” attitude, where each side is viewed favorably (while this would refer to both Israel and Hamas, it may be that respondents see “both sides” as Israel and the “Palestinians”).

The Trump plan, certainly an “out-of-the-box” proposal, had the support of between 24% and 32% of our respondents. The “pro-plan” introduction resulted in a bump in the plan’s support level and the feeling that the plan would reduce the likelihood that Gazans would return to terror in the future (28% vs. 19%).While the differences in our results did not reach statistical significance, this is likely due to our sample size, as increasing the sample size would have yielded statistically significant differences with the pattern of results. Notwithstanding the formal statistical aspect, the observable differences we found seem to indicate that the messaging contained in the “pro-plan” statement affects the results, increasing the likelihood of support among our respondents.

Conclusion

The notion of relocating Palestinian citizens outside the area controlled by Israel (often referred to as “transfer”) has always been considered outside the international consensus.⁵ The Trump plan seems to have thrown a wild card into conventional diplomacy, which has traditionally held the “two states for two peoples” formally as the only viable option in the Israel-Palestinian dynamic, despite the problems associated with the approach.⁶ The relatively significant support among a sample of random Americans for the Trump plan, especially when presented with positive arguments in favor of the plan, presents a challenge to standard diplomatic approaches and opens discussion to alternatives to the heretofore universally accepted “two-state solution” approach.

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Notes