MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:
Egypt is pushing back hard against President Trump's proposal to remove Palestinians from the Gaza Strip and develop the Mediterranean enclave. The country shares a border with the territory and a peace deal with Israel that has been in place for nearly 50 years. So now our key question about this idea is whether that peace deal might be at risk. To learn more about this Nabil Fahmy. He is a former Egyptian foreign minister and a former ambassador to the United States. Good morning, Minister. Thank you so much for joining us.
NABIL FAHMY: Good morning. Thank you for inviting me.
MARTIN: So given your understanding of the dynamics in both countries, I just wanted to ask how you reacted when you first heard of this idea.
FAHMY: Sure. I wasn't surprised that there was a desire to displace the Palestinians because that's been the position of the Israeli right for generations. But I was flabbergasted that the U.S. president would embrace a proposal that is illegal, impractical politically and unapplicable. And my reasons for that are quite simple. The U.S. is the permanent member of the Security Council, and if you want the main superpower, and you have a responsibility to respect international law, but I would add to that that it is really impossible to expect Palestinians, after 70 years of occupation, to hand over their territories peacefully to a third party, in this case, the U.S. And finally, the idea is that all of this would be done by Arabs, financed by Arabs is just illogical.
MARTIN: So the Trump administration has walked back some of this, saying the Palestinians would only be temporarily relocated, that no U.S. troops would be involved. Does that change anything? Does this ameliorate any of the alarm or outrage that has been sparked by this?
FAHMY: No, not at all, because in essence, the Palestinians don't want to leave the territory. They want to return to Gaza, and we are ready, and we're going to convene a conference for this purpose. We are ready to help them do that. It's going to be difficult, and it's going to cost a lot of money, but it cannot be isolated from the political desire to have their own state or to live beyond the Israeli occupation.
MARTIN: What steps is Egypt taking to try sort of to intervene in this thinking? Are they communicating with the Trump administration directly to register objections to this? What steps is Egypt doing?
FAHMY: Definitely so. President Sisi has issued a statement personally about this. The foreign minister, Abdelatty, is coming to Washington in a day or two. And we are in touch, of course, internationally with a number of international players. Again, it's not an anti-anything. It is a pro-peace approach which requires all of us to respect international law and to fulfill the political rights of all the parties in the region. And that's why we have continued to support the very difficult process, but the only option available, which is a two-state solution.
MARTIN: Would this plan, if the administration - if the Trump administration were to seriously pursue it, would this affect Egypt's peace deal with Israel, which, as we said, has been in place for nearly half a century?
FAHMY: Well, again, there's no better source on this than the - our president itself. His public statement says this would threaten our national security. That's the answer to that question.
MARTIN: The Associated Press is reporting that Israel is reportedly already preparing for the departure of Palestinians from Gaza. And this was reported just after President Trump made this announcement. I'm trying to understand what would happen if Palestinians were to be forced to evacuate from Gaza, even temporarily. Like, where would they go?
FAHMY: I think the report you mentioned is correct. And that's why I said at the beginning I'm not surprised that this idea keeps coming up. The Israeli approach is let them leave - anywhere. But ultimately, the Israeli traditional position is, have them move to Arab countries, especially Jordan. And that's really where the right keeps pushing.
MARTIN: So you don't think that Egypt is a target for this - even this temporary resettlement, because people may remember that Egypt closed its borders with Gaza at certain points to keep presumably refugees from coming out.
FAHMY: Oh, I think it's a target, and that's why President Sisi said our national security is threatened here. But I also think that the biggest target is Jordan, and that's a threat to Jordan's national security. Why is it seen that way? Well, the Jordanians, of course, have a very large number of citizens of Palestinian origin already. But you're going to add greater numbers that change the demographic structure of the country, then that's a threat to their national security. We have consistently argued that we want peace between Arabs and Israelis, and that involves enabling the Palestinians to have their nation state. So we're not going to directly or implicitly engage and support a process that forces Palestinians out.
MARTIN: That is Nabil Fahmy. He's a former Egyptian foreign minister. He's a former ambassador to the United States, and we reached him in Cairo. Minister Fahmy, thank you so much for speaking with us.
FAHMY: Most welcome, Michel. Thank you. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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