From: Al Jazeera January 7, 2025
What further hell could Trump bring to the Gaza Strip?

Omar Rahman, a fellow at the Middle East Council on Global Affairs, spoke to Al Jazeera about Trump’s comment that “all hell will break out in the Middle East” if the captives are not released by the time, he gets into office.

“What further hell could you bring on the Gaza Strip than is already being imposed on it?” Rahman asked.

“You need to tackle … structural issues. That doesn’t mean the US as a superpower, with all the economic and military power it has, can’t take further actions … to step up the pressure on all the parties,” he said.

He said, it is hard to know exactly what Trump entails by this threat, but he suggested that it could mean he might be willing to use military force against Iran or “green light further ethnic cleansing in the Gaza Strip”.

Rahman added that Trump might also “be just leaning into the role of the kind of unpredictable, the unwieldy leader, the bully, and hoping that people fear that and kind of just bend the knee.”