'He didn't say anything like that before!' Pro-Trump Muslim voter aghast by his Gaza plan

A Muslim voter in Dearborn, Michigan who backed President Donald Trump told NPR he was horrified at the president's plan to redevelop the Gaza strip as a hotel-lined tourist destination in the Middle East.

As the question of how to rebuild when the war is over continues to linger, Trump has repeatedly insisted the U.S. will secure the territory, and that "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." He has not mentioned anything about returning displaced Gaza civilians to what's left of their communities.

Ibrahim Duhaini, a medical physicist, stated that he regrets supporting Trump upon finding out that was his attitude on how to rebuild the terroritory, devastated by the Israel-Hamas War.

"No," he said when asked by an NPR correspondent if he would have voted for Trump had he known this would be his proposal for resolving the conflict. "He didn't say anything like that before. When he came to Dearborn, the community, he said that he would strive for peace and justice for the whole region."

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Faye Nemer of the MENA Chamber of Commerce in Michigan agreed, calling Trump's remarks "unbecoming" and saying they would damage the Republican Party in Michigan, a longtime swing state that backed Trump in 2016, then Biden in 2020, and Trump in 2024, and where Democrats currently dominate the state government and legislature.

Throughout the Israel-Hamas War, which was kicked off by the brutal October 7 terrorist attack and massacre of Israeli citizens that left hundreds of people abducted as hostages into the Gaza territory, the Biden administration pushed Israel into ceasefire talks, demanded Israel allow humanitarian aid into Gaza, and sanctioned radical Israeli settler groups that committed violence in Palestinian areas. However, the former president did not limit U.S. arms sales to Israel aside from certain types of heavy bombs, leading a number of Muslim activists around the country to outright campaign against him.

Since Trump has taken office, U.S. policy has cast off any pretense of qualifiers on support for Israel's position in the war, regardless of human rights concerns. In addition to lifting the bomb restrictions and sanctions, Trump has stood by as Israel blocks all humanitarian aid into Gaza, and, for good measure, has warned that any school that allows "illegal" anti-Israel protests will have its funding stripped and any foreign student participants arrested or deported.