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gaza
Trump's Great Replacement Theory for Gaza: 'We Will Replace You'
Like a slumlord eager to get rid of tenants so that he can raze the property and build a new skyscraper, Trump doesn’t care about the current inhabitants.
Feb 14, 2025
“They are coming to replace us.”
It sounds like the tagline of a horror movie. And indeed, what the far right whispers into ears, chants at hate-filled rallies, and translates into odious legislation in white-majority countries is very much a horror movie in that it is both scary and untrue.
In country after country, the far right has been promoting its horror movie premise that a horde of faceless immigrants is flooding across the border, aided by liberals, and displacing the native-born population. This campaign built around the Great Replacement conspiracy has mobilized White people of different socioeconomic backgrounds to amplify their pride, their power, and their privilege in the face of a vast, inchoate fear.
Fear wins elections, unfortunately. But let’s be clear, the Great Replacement is one of the greatest hoaxes of recent memory, right up there with the notion that COVID vaccines kill people rather than save them. Immigrants, after all, are saving countries throughout the Global North, which otherwise would be not-so-slowly erasing themselves. The EU’s fertility rate, at 1.46 in 2022, is well below the replacement rate of 2.1. The U.S. rate, which dropped to 1.62 in 2023, is not substantially different.
The Great Replacement, once whispered in the corners of bars and Internet chatrooms, is now being shouted in public places, as the far-right campaign has gone mainstream. Donald Trump is probably more responsible for this dismal state of affairs than anyone else.
The Great Replacement, once whispered in the corners of bars and Internet chatrooms, is now being shouted in public places, as the far-right campaign has gone mainstream.
The once-and-again president hasn’t just translated the Great Replacement theory into domestic policy by closing the border with Mexico and deporting as many people as possible. He has weaponized the theory as part of U.S. foreign policy. It’s no longer a matter of stopping people from leaving “shithole” countries to come to the United States.
To the people of Gaza, Trump has essentially proclaimed, “We are coming to replace you.”
Out of the Blue?
Trump has long flirted with the Great Replacement theory. During the 2024 election, he asserted that Democrats were encouraging an inflow of the undocumented so that they could vote against Trump (they couldn’t, by law, so they didn’t). Before the 2016 election, Trump claimed that it would be the last U.S. election that Republicans had a chance of winning (for the same erroneous reason).
Being wrong has never stopped Trump. He doubles down, which means he’s even wronger the next time around.
Trump’s hostility toward Palestine and Palestinians is also nothing new. During his first term, charging “chronic bias against Israel,” Trump withdrew the United States from the UN Human Rights Council. He closed the PLO’s office in Washington, D.C. and deleted funding for UNRWA, the agency that supports Palestinian refugees. In a boon to the Israeli right, Trump broke a global convention by moving the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.
All that time, he was trying to negotiate a megadeal to facilitate the diplomatic recognition of Israel by all major regional actors. As I wrote in 2020,
Where does this leave Palestinians? Up a creek without a state. The Trump administration has used its much-vaunted “deal of the century” to make any future deal well-nigh impossible. In collaboration with Netanyahu, Trump has strangled the two-state solution in favor of a single Israeli state with a permanent Palestinian underclass.
But what Trump is proposing now with respect to Gaza is hubris beyond anything he has ever publicly considered. The president has proposed to expel all 2 million citizens of Gaza to nearby countries, none of which has even the slightest interest in accepting them. The Gazans would have no right of refusal and no right of return. Trump has threatened both Jordan and Egypt with economic penalties if they don’t welcome the expelled. Given domestic considerations, neither country is likely to bow to that kind of pressure.
Imperialism Repackaged
The United States was late to the nineteenth-century game of colonialism. Even though there wasn’t as much land to grab by the 1890s, the United States jumped right in: Hawaii, Puerto Rico, Cuba, the Panama Canal.
Donald Trump must feel as if the United States is late to the game this time around, too. Russia has grabbed a chunk of Ukraine. Israel is reasserting control over Gaza. Turkey sliced off a piece of Syria. China effectively absorbed Hong Kong.
Nothing betokens a healthy empire like a steady diet of territory. Thus, Trump has talked of reasserting control over the Panama Canal. He is eyeing the vastness of Greenland like Secretary of State William Seward once coveted Alaska. Even good neighbor Canada isn’t excluded from Trump’s greedy gaze.
Like most fabulizing colonialists, Trump has promised the Gazans that “We’ll build beautiful communities for the 1.9 million people. We’ll build beautiful communities, safe communities — could be five, six, could be two, but we’ll build safe communities a little bit away from where they are, where all of this danger is.”
The Gazans know that this is nonsense. Overcrowded refugee camps in Jordan and Lebanon have existed for over 70 years, and no one has managed to turn those into “beautiful” or “safe” communities. Like a slumlord eager to get rid of tenants so that he can raze the property and build a new skyscraper, Trump doesn’t care about the current inhabitants. The focus instead is on building an oligarchs’ retreat that’s a short flight from Israeli, Gulf, and Egyptian elites.
The Great Replacement is a clear case of psychological projection, like an inveterate liar who is always calling his opponents liars or a serial rapist who constantly complains about rapists coming from over the border. “They” are not the problem; we the wealthy countries are the problem. Waves of immigrants are escaping wars that rich countries supported or economic conditions that rich nations helped to create through neoliberal reforms or climate conditions that rich industrialized powers have largely produced and subsequently ignored.
All these conditions have converged to push Gazans off the land. Yet, despite this adversity, they want to stay on their land and achieve some measure of political sovereignty. Finally, there’s a people who want to stay, and now Trump wants them to go.
The irony would be laughable—if it weren’t a war crime.
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Idiotic Ideas Aside, Trump's Peace Efforts Highlight the Dems' Failures
Why did the Democrats under former President Joe Biden choose to transform the party into one that embraced war and glorified warmongers like Cheney, while protecting and enabling a genocide?
Feb 13, 2025
In less than three weeks, U.S. President Donald Trump secured a cease-fire in Gaza, spoke directly to Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodomyr Zelensky, and kickstarted diplomacy to end the Ukraine war. At the same time, he has also put forward some idiotic ideas, such as pushing Palestinians out of Gaza and making Canada the 51st state.
But it raises important questions: Why didn't the Biden administration choose to push for an end to the wars in Gaza and Ukraine? Why didn't the majority of the Democrats demand it? Instead, they went down the path of putting Liz Cheney on a pedestal and having former Vice President Kamala Harris brag about having the most lethal military in the world while Trump positioned himself as a peace candidate—justifiably or not.
A profound reckoning is needed within the Democratic Party to save it from slipping into becoming neocon by default.
Undoubtedly, Trump's plans in Gaza may make matters worse and his diplomacy with Putin may fail. But that isn't the point.
The point is: Why did Trump choose to pursue diplomacy and seek an end to the wars, and why did the Democrats under former President Joe Biden choose to transform the party into one that embraced war and glorified warmongers like Cheney, while protecting and enabling a genocide?
What happened that caused the party to vilify its own voices for peace—such as Reps. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) and Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.)—while embracing some of the architects of the Iraq war?
And all of this, of course, in complete defiance of where the party base was (throughout the Gaza war, the base supported a cease-fire with 70% majority, for instance).
A profound reckoning is needed within the Democratic Party to save it from slipping into becoming neocon by default.
And with the pace at which Trump is moving, that reckoning needs to come fast. It will, for instance, be a severe mistake if the party positions itself to the right of Trump and reflexively opposes him on every foreign policy issue instead of basing the party's positions on solid principles, such as centering diplomacy, military restraint, and peace. Trump currently speaks more about peace than the Democrats do.
A senior Democratic lawmaker asked me rhetorically last week if I knew anyone who was happy with the foreign policy of Biden and voted for Harris on that basis.
I was happy to hear that the question was being asked. That's a good first step.
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Nearly 400 Rabbis, Jewish Leaders Say 'No' to Trump Push for Ethnic Cleansing of Gaza
"It is vitally important that we in the American Jewish community add our voices to all those refusing to entertain this insidious plan," one rabbi said of Trump's proposal.
Feb 13, 2025
Over 350 rabbis and dozens of Jewish public figures on Thursday placed a full-page advertisement in The New York Times protesting President Donald Trump's proposal to force all Palestinians out of the Gaza Strip and take over the coastal enclave recently decimated by U.S.-armed Israeli forces.
"Trump has called for the removal of all Palestinians from Gaza," the ad states. "Jewish people say NO to ethnic cleansing!"
The ad then lists the hundreds of people who signed on, including V (formerly Eve Ensler), Peter Beinart, Judith Butler, Molly Crabapple, Ben Cohen, Ilana Glazer, Tavi Gevinson, Nan Goldin, Naomi Klein, and Joaquin, Rain, and Summer Phoenix.
"Donald Trump—like Pharaoh in the Bible—seems to believe he is God with authority to rule, own, and dominate our country and the world," said Rabbi Yosef Berman of New Synagogue Project in Washington, D.C., a signatory to the Times ad.
"Jewish teaching is clear: Trump is not God and cannot take away Palestinians inherent dignity or steal their land for a real estate deal," Berman continued. "Trump's desire to ethnically cleanse Palestinians from Gaza is morally abhorrent. Jewish leaders reject Trump's attempts to wring profit from displacement and suffering and must act to stop this heinous crime."
Glazer, a comedian and actor, similarly stressed that "we, Jews, and all of us who care about basic human rights, must speak up and stand up to ensure Palestinians remain on their land, so they can rebuild their homes and lives in Gaza after the genocidal destruction they have endured. All of our safety is intertwined."
Today's NY Times. We, too, #SayNoToEthnicCleansing! So proud of our ED, R' @mhughesrob.bsky.social (+ board member Rabbi Andrea London), among the hundreds of Jewish clergy, professionals, lay leaders who signed on. Add your support at www.saynotoethniccleansing.org - click "sign on" in URH corner.
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— Partners for Progressive Israel (@partners4israel.bsky.social) February 13, 2025 at 9:59 AM
Israel faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice for its 15-month military response to the Hamas-led October 7, 2023 attack. The Israeli assault killed more than 61,000 Palestinians in Gaza, according to estimates by local officials. A fragile cease-fire took effect last month.
After Hamas threatened to suspend the release of additional hostages over Israeli violations of the deal—which prompted Israel to threaten more violence, seemingly backed by Trump—the group said Thursday it would free three captives this weekend.
The ad in the Times on Thursday is just part of the growing opposition to Trump's proposal to kick Palestinians out of Gaza and turn the territory into what he claimed could be the "Riviera of the Middle East." Polling published Wednesday by Data for Progress shows that a majority of Americans are against the United States seizing control of Gaza, and nearly 7 in 10 oppose sending U.S. troops for the takeover.
A coalition of over 100 groups led by A New Policy—founded by Biden administration officials who resigned in protest—and the Quaker organization Friends Committee on National Legislation said Monday that they "decry and oppose any effort or initiative, and any calls for, the forcible displacement of Palestinians from Gaza, and support the joint statement of Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, the Palestinian Authority, and the Arab League that similarly rejected any such steps."
The Guardianreported Thursday that Cody Edgerly, director of the In Our Name Campaign and one of the organizers of the Times ad, pointed to Trump's relationship with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, saying that it came at "a critical time as political redlines that were once thought immovable are rapidly shifting as the Trump-Netanyahu alliance takes hold again."
It has been "heartening to witness such a rapid outpouring of support from across the denominational and political spectrum," added Edgerly. "Our message to Palestinians is that you are not alone, our attention has not wavered, and we are committed to fighting with every breath we have to stop ethnic cleansing in Gaza."
Every day, more and more Jewish leaders break from decades of silence to reject ethnic cleansing. Thank you to these 350 rabbis using your voices in this moment to oppose Trump’s plans in Gaza and #SayNoToEthnicCleansing. #GazaIsNotForSale
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— Jews For Racial & Economic Justice (@jfrejnyc.bsky.social) February 13, 2025 at 8:13 AM
Beinart, editor-at-large of Jewish Currents and author of Being Jewish After the Destruction of Gaza: A Reckoning, said in a statement that "as someone who loves the American Jewish community, and lives my life in the American Jewish community, and could not imagine another way of living. It is utterly horrifying to see the degree to which people who enjoy great legitimacy and respect in our community are willing to support something that would be considered one of the greatest crimes of the 21st century."
Another signatory to the ad, Rabbi Toba Spitzer of Congregation Dorshei Tzedek in Newton, Massachusetts, said that "it is vitally important that we in the American Jewish community add our voices to all those refusing to entertain this insidious plan."
Nazi leader Adolf Hitler's "dream of making Germany 'Judenrein,' 'cleansed of Jews,' led to the slaughter of our people," Spitzer added. "We know as well as anyone the violence that these kinds of fantasies can lead to. It is time to make the cease-fire permanent, bring all of the hostages home, and join in efforts to rebuild Gaza for the sake of and with the people who live there."
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