Hello and welcome to News Hour from the BBC World Service.

We're coming to you live from London. I'm James Menendez.

Now, if one of Donald Trump's ambitions is to dominate news coverage around the world,

well, he certainly achieved that today with his startling announcement last night

that he wants the United States to take control of the Gaza Strip

and turn it into what he called the Riviera of the Middle East.

The U.S. will take over the Gaza Strip,

and we will do a job with it too.

We'll own it and be responsible for dismantling all of the dangerous,

unexploded bombs and other weapons on the site,

level the site and get rid of the destroyed buildings, level it out, create an economic

development that will supply unlimited numbers of jobs and housing for the people of the area.

In the meantime, though, the people of the area, the Palestinians,

would be encouraged to move elsewhere to neighbouring countries.

I believe we can resettle were his words.

Well, this extraordinary proposal was majoring a news conference at the White House

with the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu,

who, you won't be surprised

to hear, warmly welcomed it. I mentioned again tonight our three goals. And the third goal is to make

sure that Gaza never poses a threat to Israel again. President Trump is taking it to a much higher level.

He sees a different future for that piece of land that has been the focus of so much terrorism,

so many attacks against us, so many trials and so many tribulations.

...