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Saudi Arabia and other Arab countries condemned on Sunday remarks by Israel’s prime minister who appeared to suggest in an interview that a Palestinian state could be established on Saudi territory.
Benjamin Netanyahu’s remarks, which some Israeli media characterised as a joke, came with the region already on edge after US President Donald Trump proposed taking over the territory and displacing Gazans abroad.
Arab League chief Ahmed Aboul Gheit said on Sunday that the thinking behind Netanyahu’s remarks “is unacceptable and reflects a complete detachment from reality”, adding that such ideas “are nothing more than mere fantasies or illusions”.
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The Saudi foreign ministry stressed its “categorical rejection to such statements that aim to divert attention from the continuous crimes committed by the Israeli occupation against the Palestinian brothers in Gaza”.
A ministry statement welcomed “the condemnation, disapproval and total rejection announced by the brotherly countries towards what Benjamin Netanyahu stated regarding the displacement of the Palestinian people”.
In a television interview on Thursday, right-wing Israeli journalist Yaakov Bardugo was discussing with Netanyahu the prospect of diplomatic normalisation with Saudi Arabia when he appeared to misspeak, attributing to Riyadh the stance that there would be “no progress without a Saudi state”.
“Palestinian state?” Netanyahu corrected him. “Unless you want the Palestinian state to be in Saudi Arabia,” the Israeli premier quipped. “They (the Saudis) have plenty of territory.”
Netanyahu went on to describe the talks leading up to the Abraham Accords, in which several Arab countries normalised ties with Israel, concluding: “I think we should allow this process to take its course.”
‘We’ll do the job’
Meanwhile, Netanyahu hailed Trump’s widely criticised plan to move Palestinians out of the war-battered Gaza Strip, saying Israel is willing to “do the job”.
In a Fox News interview aired late Saturday as the premier was wrapping up a visit to Washington, Netanyahu defended Trump’s proposal, which has sparked concern and condemnation across the Middle East and the world.
“I think that President Trump’s proposal is the first fresh idea in years, and it has the potential to change everything in Gaza,” Netanyahu said, adding that it represents a “correct approach” to the future of the Palestinian territory.
“All Trump is saying, ‘I want to open the gate and give them an option to relocate temporarily while we rebuild the place physically’,” Netanyahu said.
Trump “never said he wants American troops to do the job. Guess what? We’ll do the job,” Netanyahu declared.
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