Donald Trump suggested in a radio interview with the conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt that was broadcast on Monday on the anniversary of the October 7 terrorist attacks and hostage-taking by Hamas, which controls Gaza, that he had visited war-torn Gaza in the past, reports the New York Times.
There is no record of Trump ever visiting Gaza and when asked to clarify, a campaign aide, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said that Gaza is “in Israel” and that Trump has visited Israel.
The Gaza Strip is not part of Israel and has never been. Gaza was occupied by Israel from 1967 until 2005, when Israel unilaterally withdrew from the territory and in 2007, after Hamas took over Gaza, Israel and Egypt imposed a blockade that restricted access to the area.
There is no record of Trump ever being in Gaza, during his time as president or as a businessman. In 2017 Trump visited Israel and traveled to the West Bank for a meeting with the president of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas, in Bethlehem. The West Bank is a separate territory that is about 20 miles from Gaza at its nearest point.
In the interview, Hewitt asked Trump if Gaza, which has been largely destroyed over the last year during air and ground strikes, in retaliation for the Oct. 7 massacre, could “be Monaco if it was rebuilt the right way? Could Gaza be something that all the Palestinian people would be proud of, would want to live in, would benefit them?”
Trump replied, “Gaza could be better than Monaco. It has the best location in the Middle East, the best water, the best everything. It is the best, I’ve said it for years. You know when — I’ve been there. It’s a rough place, before the attacks and before what’s happened over the last couple of years.”
Asked later what Trump was referring to when he said he had “been there,” a Trump campaign official said, “Gaza is in Israel. President Trump has been to Israel.”
The comment renews questions about how Trump would approach the region if he wins another term. Some in Israel, including hard-liners in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s governing coalition, favor the idea of reoccupying and annexing Gaza.
Trump has focused on supporting Israel a main part of his campaign over the past year. His supporters have praised several previous policy decisions he made, including moving the US embassy to Jerusalem from Tel Aviv and the historic Abraham Accords that normalized relations between Israel and some Arab nations, pushed by Trump’s former ambassador to Israel, David Friedman, and Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner.
Trump has made it clear that he believes Jewish voters in the US should support him for those and other policies, “I did more for Israel than anybody. I did more for the Jewish people than anybody.”