Jared Kushner Praises 'Very Valuable' Potential Of Gaza's 'Waterfront Property'

About 1.5 million displaced Palestinians are sheltering in the southern Gaza town of Rafah.

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — Jared Kushner, Donald Trump’s former White House adviser and his son-in-law, praised the “very valuable” potential of Gaza’s “waterfront property,” suggesting that Israel should remove civilians while it “cleans up” the area.

“Gaza’s waterfront property, it could be very valuable, if people would focus on building up livelihoods,” Kushner said in an interview dated Feb. 15, posted earlier this month on the YouTube channel of the Middle East Initiative, a program of Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government, and reported first on Tuesday by The Guardian. “If you think about all the money that’s gone into this tunnel network and into all the munitions, if that would have gone into education or innovation, what could have been done?”

“It’s a little bit of an unfortunate situation there, but I think from Israel’s perspective, I would do my best to move the people out and then clean it up,” Kushner added. “But I don’t think that Israel has stated that they don’t want the people to move back there afterwards.”

Responding Tuesday on X to “those dishonestly using selected parts” of his remarks, Kushner posted a video of the entire interaction, saying he stood by his comments “and believe the Palestinian people’s lives will improve ONLY when the international community and their citizenry start demanding accountability from their leadership.”

About 1.5 million displaced Palestinians are sheltering in the southern Gaza town of Rafah, as Israel looks to eliminate Hamas following the militant group’s deadly Oct. 7 attack. More than 30,000 Palestinians have been killed and over 70,000 wounded in the Gaza Strip since Israel’s war on Hamas began.