The Trump administration is working on a plan to permanently relocate up to 1 million Palestinians from the Gaza Strip to Libya, five people with knowledge of the effort told NBC News on Friday.
The plan is under serious enough consideration that the administration has discussed it with Libya’s leadership, two people with direct knowledge of the plans and a former US official said.
In exchange for the resettling of Palestinians, the administration would potentially release to Libya billions of dollars of funds that the US froze more than a decade ago, those three people said.
No final agreement has been reached, and Israel has been kept informed of the administration’s discussions, the same three sources said.
The State Department and the National Security Council did not respond to multiple requests for comment before this article was published.
After publication, a spokesperson told NBC News, “these reports are untrue.”
“The situation on the ground is untenable for such a plan. Such a plan was not discussed and makes no sense,” the spokesperson said.
Basem Naim, a senior Hamas official, said that Hamas was not aware of any discussions about moving Palestinians to Libya.
“Palestinians are very rooted in their homeland, very strongly committed to the homeland and they are ready to fight up to the end and to sacrifice anything to defend their land, their homeland, their families, and the future of their children,” Naim said in response to questions from NBC News. “[Palestinians] are exclusively the only party who have the right to decide for the Palestinians, including Gaza and Gazans, what to do and what not to do.”
Representatives of the Israeli government declined to comment.
