ANKARA

Saudi Arabia's Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan said on Friday that the kingdom firmly rejects any attempts to forcibly relocate Palestinians from the Gaza Strip, regardless of the pretext.

“We categorically reject the displacement of the Palestinian people from Gaza under any slogan,” Prince Faisal told a press conference after the Gaza Contact Group meeting held on the sidelines of the Antalya Diplomacy Forum in Türkiye.

He also condemned the framing of such plans as “voluntary migration,” stressing that such terminology is unacceptable under the current conditions.

“The talk of voluntary migration cannot be accepted when Palestinians are deprived of the most basic necessities of life,” he said.

US President Donald Trump has proposed displacing 2.1 million Palestinians from Gaza and transforming the enclave into a “Riviera.

The Saudi minister called for an “immediate ceasefire in Gaza and underscored the urgent need to ensure the unhindered delivery of humanitarian aid to the besieged enclave.”

The Israeli army renewed its assault on Gaza on March 18, shattering the Jan. 19 ceasefire and prisoner exchange agreement.

More than 50,800 Palestinians, most of them women and children, have been killed in Gaza since the Oct. 7, 2023 Hamas attacks. The military campaign has left the enclave in ruins and rendered it almost uninhabitable.

Last November, the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.

Israel also faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice for its war on the enclave.