Former Chancellor George Osborne has dismissed the US President’s plan to transform Gaza as “fanciful”.
Addressing more than 1,000 guests at Jewish Care’s annual Topland fundraiser, Osborne said the suggestion – which came after Donald Trump shared an AI-generated video of Gaza on social media with casino hotels and skyscrapers – “ain’t gonna happen”.
He said: “There is no one in the world who is going to allow these several million people who live in Gaza to be cleared out, for a bunch of Trump resorts to be built. It’s fanciful. Obviously it would be a neat solution, which is why people are superficially attracted to it, but it ain’t gonna happen.”
Speaking in conversation with leading journalist and Tory peer Lord Daniel Finklestein, Osborne – former editor of the Evening Standard who is now a partner at investment firm Robey Warshaw LLP – went onto describe himself as “a big friend of Israel”, speaking about the October 7 Hamas attack, Israeli hostages and the importance of the Jewish State developing positive relations with “the Gulf”, as well as the US.
Topland Business Group Lunch Committee members with Jewish Care President, Chair, CEO and Director of Fundraising & Marketing, with Phillip Greenwold Award winner Trevor Avery with Harry Olmer MBE, and guest speakers The Rt Hon George Osborne CH and Lord Finkelstein OBE, Pic: Justin Grainge
He said: “Security comes in numbers and alliances, and you don’t want to be just on your own – or dependent on the whim of an American President.”
At the event, Osborne also addressed the televised spat between the US President and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky at the White House last week, after President Trump accused Zelensky of “gambling with World War Three”.
“Anyone who cares about the Western world, with our values and relationships, would have been depressed by that,” Mr Osborne said, adding: “These are supposed to be allies, working out how they are going to work together to get peace in Ukraine against Russia. And they are having a fairly unpleasant public spat. The person who would have probably liked that, was Vladimir Putin himself.”
The Jewish Care event, which took place at the JW Marriott Grosvenor House London, raised £485,000 for the community’s leading social welfare charity – a record amount for the Topland business lunch.
Steven Lewis, president of Jewish Care, which reaches 12,000 people every week and needs £20 million annually to run, said: “Many of the life-changing services we provide receive no government funding, so we are entirely dependent on the community’s support.”
