Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdel Aati informed his American counterpart Marco Rubio in Washington that Arab countries reject US President Donald Trump's plan to displace Palestinians from Gaza and control the Strip.

The Egyptian Foreign Ministry said in a statement that Abdel Aty stressed during his meeting with Rubio in Washington on Monday the importance of accelerating the reconstruction of Gaza while the Palestinians remain there.

The statement quoted Abdel-Ati as saying that he looks forward to working with the new US administration to achieve “the desired just peace in the Middle East, in a way that responds to the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people, most notably their right to establish their independent state on all their national soil.”

The State Department issued a statement after the meeting that did not explicitly mention Trump’s plan, but said Rubio “emphasized the importance of close cooperation to advance planning for governance and security in post-conflict Gaza, and emphasized that Hamas can never govern Gaza or threaten Israel again.”

Abdel Aati also met separately with US Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff and made similar remarks, the Egyptian Foreign Ministry said.

The ministry also said that the minister "stressed the need to find a political horizon that leads to a final settlement of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, in accordance with international legitimacy resolutions, in a way that guarantees the establishment of an independent Palestinian state on the lines of June 4, 1967, with East Jerusalem as its capital, and achieves security and stability in the Middle East."

Any proposal for the Palestinians to leave Gaza, which they want as part of their independent state, has always been completely rejected by the Palestinian leadership for decades, and has also been rejected by neighboring Arab countries since the outbreak of the Gaza war in 2023.

The Egyptian Foreign Ministry said in a statement, “Egypt calls on the international community, with its various international and regional components, to unite behind a political vision to resolve the Palestinian issue, and for this vision to be based on the necessity of ending the historical injustice to which the Palestinian people have been and continue to be subjected.”

She added, "In this context, Egypt adheres to its position rejecting any infringement of these rights, including the right to self-determination, remaining on the land and independence, and it also adheres to the right of return for Palestinian refugees who were forced to leave their homeland."

On January 25, Trump first proposed that Egypt and Jordan accept Palestinians from Gaza. In the days that followed, he proposed that the United States take control of Gaza and permanently displace Palestinians from the Strip without the right to return.

Trump's comments fuel long-standing Palestinian fears of being permanently removed from their homes, and have been described by human rights advocates and the United Nations as a proposal for ethnic cleansing.

Egyptian Foreign Ministry spokesman Tamim Khalaf said that an extensive discussion took place between the two ministers regarding “the successive developments in Gaza, Syria, Libya, Sudan, the Horn of Africa and the Red Sea.”

The spokesman pointed out that the meeting between Abdel-Ati and Rubio also touched on the situation in Sudan, where Abdel-Ati stressed Egypt's support for the Sudanese state institutions, with the necessity of working to cease fire there, and respecting the sovereignty and unity of Sudanese territories.

Abdel-Ati also stressed the importance of starting a political process that does not exclude any component of Syrian society, emphasizing the need to respect the unity and integrity of Syrian territory and Egypt's full support for the Syrian people.