Is South Sudan part of Israel’s Gaza displacement plan?

Media reports about a proposal to send a sizable number of Palestinians from Gaza to South Sudan have recently flooded the news. Major outlets—from Al Jazeera to The New York Times, Associated Press, and Reuters—have all reported that the possibility of resettling Palestinians in South Sudan was being discussed in bilateral talks between Israel and South Sudan, with the deputy foreign minister and the foreign minister exchanging visits to Tel Aviv and Juba, respectively. The reports have sparked intense debate and outrage among both South Sudanese and Palestinians. Some Arab countries have also voiced strong rejection of the proposal.

The two governments have, however, issued official statements denying the report and the Palestinian Authority’s president, Mahmoud Abbas, welcomed Juba’s rejection. But the denials have neither quietened the debate nor removed suspicions among the populace—especially in South Sudan, where many people quickly condemned the proposal. Prominent politicians, academics, students, civic activists, and public officials became highly critical of the government for even agreeing to discuss such a shocking and contemptible proposal. A question many people asked was where the proposal had originated. Sources indicated that it began with the Israeli and United States governments, particularly citing the precedent of the US government's decision to deport foreign nationals serving jail terms in the US to South Sudan—a topic that remains controversial.

The recent intensification of the Israeli government's war to empty Gaza City of its two million people was also suspected to be a factor behind the resettlement proposal to South Sudan and potentially other African countries. Libya, Somaliland and Ethiopia have been mentioned among others. These reports have been persistent for months, with leaks of alleged talks being picked up by the media, followed by denials. Observers have noted that US president Donald Trump and Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu once declared their intention to turn the Gaza Strip into a “Riviera of the Middle East” after removing its population. It seems that all parties involved—the governments of South Sudan, Israel, and the United States—are using this proposal as a tool to achieve other foreign policy goals. In the case of South Sudan, for example, it has been suggested that Juba may attach the issue of US sanctions and the United Nations arms embargo to the resettlement discussions as a bargaining chip to have the sanctions lifted and to reset US–South Sudan diplomatic relations, which have cooled over the years under the weight of the civil war and the lacklustre implementation of the peace agreement.

Informal reports have indicated that the talks were either initiated by the United States government or, at the very least, that Washington is involved in behind-the-scenes discussions, and that the official statements refuting the reports were not genuine. Many people in South Sudan, however, while acknowledging that the proposal is likely rooted in foreign interests, quickly blamed the government in Juba, suggesting it is likely trying to broker a secret agreement with Tel Aviv in exchange for foreign aid that Juba desperately needs for infrastructure, agricultural development, and military cooperation.

Suspicions and outright rejection of the proposed resettlement by South Sudanese are being fuelled by a combination of events. For example, similar suggestions were made during the first year of the Israel–Hamas war in Gaza, when displaced Palestinians flocked to the Egypt–Gaza–Israel border and calls were made for Egypt to open its borders to those fleeing the military onslaught. Egypt rejected the proposal outright, claiming that such a mass exodus would result in the permanent displacement of Palestinians, pose security risks to Egypt, and potentially undermine the Palestinian struggle for self-determination citing historical precedents like the Nakba of 1948, when Palestinians who fled or were expelled from their homes were denied the right of return. Egypt’s foreign minister, Badr Abdelatty, has told CNN such an outcome would be a “red line” for his country. 

Transferring Gazans to Egypt, as President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi explained, would be an effort to liquidate the Palestinian cause and a violation of international law. 

South Sudanese have also expressed opposition to the resettlement on the basis that these Palestinians would arrive not as refugees but as a more permanent population, removed from their homeland and with nowhere else to go. Historical factors were also raised: South Sudan only recently became independent after decades of liberation wars that pitted northern Sudanese Arab Muslims against African and non-Muslim southern Sudanese. Concerns about security risks arising from these historical issues have also been voiced.

The only party that has had a limited voice in this debate is the Palestinians themselves—save for a few individuals who have rejected the proposal as a second Nakba. Wasel Abu Youssef, a member of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) Executive Committee, was quoted by Reuters as categorically rejecting any such plan, stating that the Palestinian leadership and people “reject any plan or idea to displace any of our people to South Sudan or to any other place.” Other Palestinian leaders and communities have stressed the gravity of such resettlement as a collective tragedy. Rights groups and the international community have also condemned the proposals, describing them as amounting to forced displacement and ethnic cleansing, including the United Nations.