Remarks Prior to a Meeting With King Abdullah II of Jordan and an Exchange With Reporters

President Trump. Thank you very much.

It's an honor to have King Abdullah with us. He's been a friend of mine for a long time, actually—long before even my first term. And we've had a great relationship. He's a great gentleman, a great leader, and does a fantastic job in his country.

His son—we're lucky enough to have his handsome son with us today. So it's good to see you again.

Crown Prince Hussein of Jordan. Thank you, sir.

President Trump. We've had some quick discussions just now, and we're going to have some longer discussions after this. And the relationship with Jordan has been very strong—has been with me, and I—really has been with the country. But I think I've been closer than other presidents to Jordan and what Jordan represents, and it's an honor to have you and your son with us today.

And if you'd like to say a few words, and thank you very much.

King Abdullah. Well, Mr. President, thank you very much for having us—and so short after your Inauguration, I think, just is a testament to what you said is a special relationship between our two countries and the personal relationship of friendship and trust between the two of us.

Mr. President, I truly believe that with all the challenges that we have in the Middle East that I finally see somebody that can take us across the finish line to bring stability, peace, and prosperity to all of us in the region. And it is, I think, our collective responsibility in the Middle East to continue to work with you, to support you to achieve those lofty goals.

So I'm very delighted to be here. And as you said, sir, we've got some very interesting discussions ahead of us.

President Trump. Very good.

King Abdullah. Thank you, sir.

President Trump. Very good. Thank you very much.

West Bank, Palestinian Territories

Q. Mr. President, many people in the region, especially Jordan, are worried about the annexation of the West Bank. Will you give the—His Majesty, the King, guarantee that you won't allow Israel to annex the West Bank? And how are you going to force——

President Trump. I think that's going to work out very well. That's not really what we're talking about today. I think that's something that's going to work out automatically, and it's in good shape. And we discuss it. Other people have discussed it with us and with me. That's going to work out. West Bank is going to work out very well.

Resettlement of Palestinian Refugees/Gaza, Palestinian Territories

Q. Mr. President, why should the King take in the Palestinian people? He's made clear he doesn't want to.

President Trump. Well, I don't know, but he may have just something to say, because we discussed just briefly. I think maybe you want to say it now or——

King Abdullah. Well, Mr. President, I think we have to keep in mind that there is a plan from Egypt and the Arab countries. We've been invited by Muhammad bin Salman to discussions in Riyadh. I think the point is: How do we make this work in a way that is good for everybody?

President Trump. Right.

King Abdullah. I mean, obviously, we have to look at the best interest of the United States, of the people in the region, especially to my people of Jordan. And we're going to have some interesting discussions today.

I think one of the things that we can do right away is take 2,000 children that are either cancer children or in a very ill state to Jordan as quickly as possible and then wait for, I think, the Egyptians to present their plan on how we can work with the President to work on the Gaza challenges.

[At this point, several reporters began asking questions at once.]

President Trump. I want to tell you that—excuse me. Wait. Just—please. I didn't know that, what you just said—2,000 children with cancer or other problems—and that's really a beautiful gesture. That's really good, and I—we appreciate it.

And we'll be working on the rest. With Egypt, I think, you're going to see some great progress. I think, with Jordan, you're going to see some great progress. There's three of us, and we'll have some others helping, and we're going to have some others at a very high level helping, and the whole thing will come.

It's not a complex thing to do. And with the United States being in control of that piece of land—a fairly large piece of land—you're going to have stability in the Middle East for the first time.

And the Palestinians or the people that live now in Gaza will be living beautifully in another location. They're going to be living safely. They're not going to be killed, murdered, and having to leave every 10 years. Because I've been watching this for so many years. It's nothing but trouble. Everyone is being killed. They're being robbed. It's like living in hell. And they're going to end up having a great home, great families that don't have to get mugged and killed and beaten up and harassed by Hamas and everybody else.

And I know we'll be able to work something. And you—and you—what you just said about the 2,000 is fantastic. That's so beautiful. It's music to my ears.

But we're going to be able to work something, and I know—but we're going to be able to work something, and I know we'll be able to work something also with, I believe, not—not 100 percent, but 99 percent we're going to work out something with Egypt.

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

Gaza, Palestinian Territories

Q. Mr. President, how—how is the U.S.—how is the U.S. going to own Gaza? Your White House has made clear taxpayer dollars won't be used for this.

President Trump. No, we won't need it. No, no.

Q. So what money are you going to use to buy Gaza?

President Trump. We'll—we're not going to buy anything. We're going to have it, and we're going to keep it, and we're going to make sure that there's going to be peace and there's not going to be any problem, and nobody is going to question it, and we're going to run it very properly.

And eventually, we'll have economic development at a very large scale—maybe the largest scale—on that site. And we'll have lots of good things built there, including hotels and office buildings and housing and other things. And we'll make that site into what it should be.

And the people from Gaza who wouldn't be able to be there for years, because you're talking about just to get it and prepare it and to take care of all of the problems that currently it has—as you know, tunnels and people are in those tunnels. And you have some good people and some bad people.

And you may have hostages right now. You know, you have the hostages possibly there. They don't know where they are. And you know, I have a Saturday deadline, and I don't think they're going to make the deadline, personally. I think they want to play tough guy, but we'll see how tough they are.

But it's going to be a wonderful thing. It's going to be wonderful for the Middle East. I think it will turn the Middle East. I think you're going to have peace in the Middle East. You're going to eventually have peace in the Middle East.

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

Yes, please.

Jordan-U.S. Relations/Hamas

Q. Couldn't this—couldn't this deadline risk undermining the talks that you're having with the—the king today and—risk the kind of wider peace that you're trying to——

President Trump. No, because that's not—we're not talking about a big situation. We're talking about something that can go very quickly. We're talking about—it's going to go quickly. It's not going to take a long time. Okay? That's not going to take a long time.

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

You know bullies? You know what a bully is, right? You know, the bully—I've always— and I found it throughout my life: A bully is the weakest person. And they're bullies. Hamas is bullies. The weakest people are bullies. You know that, right?

All right, go ahead.

Resettlement of Palestinian Refugees

Q. Mr. President, you were saying that Palestinians will live somewhere else safe. Where exactly do you want them to live?

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

Well, it's not where I want them to live. It's going to be where we ultimately choose as a group. And I believe we'll have a parcel of land in Jordan. I believe we'll have a parcel of land in Egypt. We may have someplace else. But I think when we finish our talks, we'll have a place where they're going to live very happily and very safely.

And you know, don't forget, they only want to be on the Gaza Strip because they don't know anything else. They never had an alternative. And they don't want to be on the Gaza Strip, but they have no choice. They have to be. And they're being killed there at levels that nobody has ever seen. No place in the world is like—is as dangerous as the Gaza Strip.

They don't want to be there. They have no alternative. When they have an alternative, not one person will want to stay where they are. Nobody wants to stay there. They're living in hell. It's a death trap.

Resettlement of Palestinian Refugees

Q. Mr. President, how do you know that the Palestinians don't want to leave their land? Some people say this is ethnic cleansing. You won't be able to force them to leave their land. They're staying there——

President Trump. We're moving them to a beautiful location where they have new homes, where they can live safely, where they'll have doctors and medical——

Q. They don't want to leave, sir.

President Trump. ——and all of those things. And I think it's going to be great. Yes. Any questions?

Q. King Abdullah, what do you think about the U.S. taking over the Gaza Strip? Do you want to see the U.S. own the Gaza Strip?

King Abdullah. Well, I think, as I said earlier, the president is looking at Egypt coming to present their plan. As I said, we will be in Saudi Arabia to discuss how we can work with the president and with the United States.

So I think let's wait until the Egyptians can come and present it to the President and not get ahead of ourselves.

Q. And is there a parcel of land in Jordan that you're willing to have Palestinians move to?

King Abdullah. Well, I think, what we said, I have to look at the best interests of my country. I think the President is very happy that we do this thing with 2,000 children as quickly as possible.

And, again, I believe that the President is looking forward to getting a group of us Arabs here to discuss the overall plan.

Q. And last question. The 2,000 children, are those from the Gaza Strip?

King Abdullah. Absolutely from the Gaza Strip.

Q. Are you willing to change your mind, Mr. President——

President Trump. It's from the Gaza Strip, the 2,000.

Resettlement of Palestinian Refugees

Q. Are you willing to change your mind if you hear the Egyptian and the Arab plan, end of the month? If they present you something different, are you open to another plan?

President Trump. I think we sort of have gone down the line. We know pretty much what is going to be presented, and I think it's going to be something that's going to be magnificent for the Palestinians. They're going to—they're going to be in love with it.

I did very well with real estate. I can tell you about real estate. They're going to be in love with it.

Gaza, Palestinian Territories

Q. But, Mr. President, does it concern you that moving 2 million people from—from——

President Trump. It's a very small number of people, relative to other things that have taken place over the decades and centuries. It's a very small number of people. And they're living a tar—a terrible life. Look at—look at the way they're living now. Nobody is—nobody is living like that in the entire world. They're living under buildings that are mostly fallen down and will continue to fall down, and they're living under—people are being killed every day. The conditions are horrible.

There are no conditions anywhere in the world that are worse than the Gaza Strip right now.

Q. But don't you have a concern——

Q. Mr. President, you said all hell——

Q. ——that they—[inaudible]—Jordan and the Egypt?

Hostages Held in Gaza, Palestinian Territories

Q. You said all hell will break out if all the hostages are not released on Saturday. What did you mean by that? And are you encouraging Netanyahu to walk away from this deal? Have you talked about this with him directly?

President Trump. So I've looked at what—at the condition of people coming out of the hostage situation, and it's horrible. I looked at the before and after yesterday. Three young men, one—one is dead now, as you know—the older gentleman who died, which everybody said he was alive and well. He's—he's dead.

But the three young men, and I looked at them from a short while ago, and I looked at them now. They are emaciated. They look like Holocaust survivors. They looked—I mean, they'll get better, but they—they're in rough shape. They were treated really badly. And we've heard things from them since.

And I think the reason that Hamas is playing so cute is because they probably—they—they saw the reactions to these three people that came out and the—and the other was—look, the one young lady had her hand blown off, practically. And they were not in great shape either, but she's missing her fingers and a big part of her hand.

You know what she did? She was stopping a bullet that was aimed at her. She went like that——

[The President held up his hand.]

——and it blew it off her hand.

No, I think what they're—I think they want time because I think they—the people that they have living are in such bad shape, because they're sending the most healthy people out because they don't want to send the least healthy people out. And there was an uproar when they saw the people from yesterday.

So these people are—so I don't want to do two, and then we do another two in another week, and then we do four in 3 weeks. No. No. They either have them out by Saturday at 12 o'clock, or all bets are off.

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

Resettlement of Palestinian Refugees

Q. Mr. President, are—would you still consider withholding aid to those countries if they don't accept your plans to accept Palestinians?

President Trump. Well, I don't want to say that, because we've had such a good relationship, and we're doing so well just in the short time that we've been talking. I mean, the King just made a statement—I didn't ask him to do that—about literally saving 2,000 young children from the Gaza Strip. We didn't know about that. You didn't know about that. Nobody did, except for the King and his son.

I assume you told your son, right?

And I just thought it was great.

No, I think we'll do something. I don't have to threaten with money. We do—we contribute a lot of money to Jordan and to Egypt, by the way—a lot to both. But I don't have to threaten that. I don't think—I think we're above that. I do believe we're above that.

Resettlement of Palestinian Refugees/October 7, 2023, Hamas Attacks on Israel/Ukraine/Russia

Q. Would you consider other countries—not Jordan and Egypt? There was talks about Indonesia, Albania, other places.

President Trump. Yes. Sure. We would. And we have other countries that want to get involved. We have a lot of people who want to get involved.

There's a great sense of wanting to help the Palestinians. They really—there's a lot of good countries out there, people that rule those countries with big hearts. And this gentleman is at the top of the list.

Q. And if they don't want to leave, how are you going to force them, Mr. President?

President Trump. Oh, they're going to be great. They're going—they're going to be very happy.

Q. Can you give us a sense——

Q. Your Majesty, should we expect——

Q. Mr. President, can—may I——

Q. ——that the Jordanian response——

Q. May I——

Q. ——would be part of a coordinated Arab response?

King Abdullah. The response will be from a multitude of countries: Arab, international. I know the Europeans want to step in. And, again, we'll probably have to look to the help of the United States to make sure that COGAT, which is the clearing agency on the Israeli side, makes it as efficient as possible, because 2,000 kids, the best way to get to them is by helicopters and get them straight to our institutions. I also believe that quite a few countries would also probably like to take some of those kids——

President Trump. That's right.

King Abdullah. ——and have them treated in their—their hospitals. So we hope to——

President Trump. No, this should have been done.

King Abdullah. ——launch this ASAP.

President Trump. Yes. And that's right.

This should have been done by the Biden administration, but you know, they didn't do anything. They didn't know what the hell they were doing. So this should have been done by the Biden administration.

This should have never happened, because October 7 would have never happened if I were president—zero chance of happening. You would have had that whole mess where the Middle East got blown up. And you wouldn't have had Ukraine and Russia fighting. That would have never happened.

And by the way, we're making good progress there, I think. I really think we're making some very good progress—[inaudible]. I really think we're making some very good progress.

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

Gaza, Palestinian Territories

Q. Mr. President, you said—you've said before that the U.S. would buy Gaza, and today you just said, "We're not going to buy Gaza."

President Trump. We're not going to have to buy. We're going to—we're going to have Gaza. We don't have to buy. There's nothing to buy. We will have Gaza.

Q. What does that mean?

President Trump. There's no reason to buy. There is nothing to buy. It's Gaza. It's a war-torn area.

We're going to take it. We're going to hold it. We're going to cherish it. We're going to get it going eventually, where a lot of jobs are going to be created for the people in the Middle East. It's got to be for the people in the Middle East.

But I think it could be a diamond. It could be an absolute, tremendous asset for the Middle East. And you're going to have peace. It's going to bring peace in the Middle East.

Gaza, the way it is right now—every 10 years, you're going to have the same thing happening. I've watched it so long, all the death and destruction of Gaza. A civilization has been wiped out in Gaza.

No, it's going to be a tremendous thing. It's fronting on the sea. It's going to be a great economic development job. It's going to put people to work—a lot of people to work. And those people are all going to be from the Middle East.

Q. And just to—and just to——

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

Q. Hold on. Just to—just to follow up with one on that for King Abdullah. Can you clarify again, sir, how do you feel about the U.S. "taking" Gaza, as the President said?

King Abdullah. Well, again, this is something that we, as Arabs, will be coming to the United States with——

President Trump. Right.

King Abdullah. ——something that we're going to talk about later, to discuss all these options.

Q. And, Mr. President, take it under what authority? It is sovereign territory?

President Trump. Under the U.S. authority.

Q. Mr. President, would you seek to personally develop property in Gaza——

President Trump. No.

Q. ——after this happens?

President Trump. No, I've had a great career in real estate.

Q. Mr. President——

President Trump. I don't——

Q. Who on your team——

President Trump. I don't—you know, when you've done what I've done in the last number of years—including the 4 years that we should have been doing something else, frankly, because people see that now for sure—but when you've done what I've done, you can just do more good for people when you're President. When you're President, we can do things—this—this is all things that should have been done, but actually things that shouldn't have had to be done.

Gaza, absolutely, it would have been—it would have been so great if the Biden administration would have started this. But actually, in all fairness to them, it was—they should have never let it happen. It did happen. And because of the fact that they let this happen—this catastrophe of October 7—something like this becomes practical and very real, meaning the development and—and all of the things that I've talked about, with respect to the Gaza Strip.

If you didn't have the October 7 catastrophe—and it was a horrible catastrophe—then probably you wouldn't be talking about that. But the only thing I can say is, this is going to bring stability and peace to the Middle East. And ultimately, when it's developed—which will be in quite a while from now, because we want to let things calm down—but when it's developed, it's going to bring tremendous numbers of jobs to the Middle East, including the people of your country.

[Several reporters spoke at once.]

Resettlement of Palestinian Refugees

Q. Mr. President, what if it does not bring peace to the Middle East? There are many Palestinians—even though you say that everything is going to be beautiful, everything is going to be lovely, and they're not going to want to go back—there are going to be people who want to go back and feel like that it is their right to do that. You haven't said will there be any type of repercussions or anything that happens.

President Trump. We don't think that's going to happen. We think it's going to—we think people are going to be very happy, thrilled. A lot of those people that you're talking about are going to end up maybe living there and maybe working there, but it will be in a different form.

We have had tremendous support for this project. And we think the biggest asset of the project: It's going to bring peace, ultimately, to the Middle East.

All right.

Q. Mr. President——

Q. Mr. President, one last question. If——

President Trump. Go ahead, behind you. No——

Q. If—just——

President Trump. ——you've asked enough. [Laughter]

Q. Okay.

2024 Presidential Election/Middle East Peace Process

Q. Mr. President, one—one of your promises on the campaign trail is to bring peace to the Middle East. It was a promise to your voter—Arab voters here. The Arab voters in the United States oppose this. What do you say to them?

President Trump. Well, you know, if you look at Michigan, where we have a large Arab population, as you know—I was just telling the king that we won—as you know, I won the Arab population. Now, when I started off, I wasn't leading, and when I finished a few months later— we started campaigning in Michigan, and when I finished, we won it by a tremendous amount, by 30 points.

So my relationship with the Arab population has been fantastic, and my relationship with the Middle East is very good—very good with all the countries—just about all the countries. Let's see, I would say all the countries. And they all want to do something, and they want to see peace in the Middle East.

So all the stories you hear about the Middle East not really wanting peace—that they want war, they want this, they want to go to a certain place—let me tell you, those stories are false. They want to have peace. I know them all very well. They want to have peace. They want to have a good life like other people, and we'll bring—this will be a big factor in bringing peace to the Middle East.

Thank you very much, everybody. Thank you.

Q. Thank you.

President Trump. Thank you very much.