By Jake Johnson
\nCommon Dreams<\/p>\n
Kushner, who served as a key Middle East adviser to Trump, said that Gaza\u2019s \u201cwaterfront property could be very valuable\u201d and urged Israel to \u201cclean it up.\u201d<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n Jared Kushner, the son-in-law of former president and presumptive 2024 Republican nominee Donald Trump, said in a recent interview that if he were in charge of Israeli policy, he would push\u00a0Gaza<\/a>\u00a0civilians into Egypt or Israel\u2019s Negev desert\u2014a proposal that critics\u00a0denounced as ethnic cleansing<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cYou want to get as many civilians out of Rafah as possible,\u201d Kushner told the faculty chair of Harvard University\u2019s Middle East Initiative, Tarek Masoud, in a March 8 interview that was\u00a0first reported widely<\/a>\u00a0on Tuesday. \u201cI think that you want to try to clear that out. I know that with diplomacy maybe you get them into Egypt.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI know that that\u2019s been refused, but [with] the right diplomacy I think it would be possible,\u201d Kushner added. \u201cBut in addition to that, the thing that I would try to do if I was Israel right now is I would just bulldoze something in the Negev, I would try to move people in there. I know that won\u2019t be the popular thing to do, but I think that that\u2019s a better option to do so you can go in and finish the job.\u201d<\/p>\n