Suggestions that territory can be 'cleaned out' show Trump has no coherent Middle East policy

The suggestion by the US president, Donald Trump, that Gaza's Palestinian population could be "cleaned out" and moved to Egypt and Jordan is an idea that has long been circulated by the Israeli right.

- Peter Beaumont

Over the decades since the six-day war in June 1967, when Israeli forces first captured the Gaza Strip, which had been under Egyptian military rule, Israeli officials and commentators have periodically pushed the notion that Palestinians in Gaza could be resettled in Egypt.

Most recently that notion was floated in a leaked paper by Israel's intelligence ministry a few weeks into the war in Gaza. It recommended Israel "evacuate the civilian population to Sinai" then create "a sterile zone of several kilometres within Egypt" that would prevent return.

If the idea was a non-starter, it was because Egypt has long let it be known that it rejects any efforts by Israel to subcontract the issue of Gaza to Cairo.

Egypt's position has been straightforward: by virtue of its long occupation, Israel is legally responsible for Gaza.