Washington — Mike Waltz, President Trump’s national security adviser, on Wednesday defended the president’s suggestion that the U.S. would take over Gaza, saying it would “bring the entire region to come with their own solutions.”
“The fact that nobody has a realistic solution, and he puts some very bold, fresh, new ideas out on the table, I don’t think should be criticized in any way,” Waltz said on “CBS Mornings.”
During a joint press conference Tuesday night with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Mr. Trump outlined a new vision for Gaza, saying the U.S. would “take over the Gaza Strip” and “own it,” while suggesting he could make the region “the Riviera of the Middle East.”
Mr. Trump did not offer any details on whether this idea was something his administration had been working on and how it would be implemented.
Waltz defended the plan, saying Mr. Trump is “not seeing any realistic solutions” about how to make conditions livable in Gaza.
“That’s what we saw, and I think that is just living in the common sense, practical reality of this awful situation that’s going on in Gaza, and has been going on for quite some time,” Waltz said.
Waltz added that the U.S. has a “shared vision” with the Israeli government that “Hamas cannot stay there,” saying “we would not allow ISIS to continue to attack us on our border.”
“We would not allow another 9/11,” he said. “The Israeli government and people deserve to never have another Oct. 7,” referring to the 2023 Hamas terrorist attack on Israel that left about 1,200 dead and abducted roughly 250 others.
When asked about what the plan means for a two-state solution in the region, which the president has voiced support for in the past, Waltz argued that the president’s comments didn’t suggest an end to the idea, saying he “didn’t hear the President say it was the end of the two state solution.” Waltz noted that Mr. Trump said Palestinians may be among the people who would live in his rebuilt vision of Gaza.
“Those are the conversations that we’re having,” Waltz said. “The president is engaging with our key allies in the region and asking for their input, asking for their ideas, and is personally engaged on this issue.”
Mr. Trump’s proposal has sent diplomatic shockwaves around the world, including from America’s diplomatic partners in the Middle East. Palestinians and Israelis also expressed shock over the move.
“We are shocked. We didn’t know about it, but it was clearly not a move pulled from the hip,” Ronen Neutra, the father of Israeli soldier Omer Neutra, who was killed in the Oct. 7 terrorist attack, told CBS News.
Netanyahu is in Washington this week as a fragile ceasefire between Israel and Hamas remains in place, which was negotiated in the final days of the Biden administration. On Tuesday, Netanyahu praised Mr. Trump for having unconventional ideas.
“After the jaws drop, people scratch their heads and they say, ‘You know, he’s right,'” Netanyahu said.
Hamas attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killed about 1,200 and roughly 250 people were abducted, setting off the nearly 16-month Israeli assault on Hamas, which has killed more than 47,000 people, according to the Palestinian territory’s Hamas-run Ministry of Health.
