Puntland officials had previously expressed willingness to take in refugees from Gaza [Getty]
Somalia has said it will refuse to be part of any plan to displace Palestinians from Gaza, following Israeli and British media reports that breakaway and autonomous regions of the country could take in Gazans.
US President Donald Trump announced a widely condemned plan earlier this month that would involve the US occupying and rebuilding Gaza while expelling its inhabitants, who would be given “new and modern homes in the region”.
The New Arab’s sister site Al-Araby Al-Jadeed however reported on Sunday a source in the Somali foreign ministry as saying that Somalia would not be a part of “displacement policies planned by Washington against Palestinians”.
He said that the Somali federal government would not comment on media reports about the displacement of Palestinians, saying that everything being discussed now was based on “leaks and rumours”.
The source added that the government would only make a statement if there was an official comment from the White House about expulsion of Gazans to Somaliland or Puntland.
Somaliland is a breakaway region of northern Somalia which declared independence in 1991 but no other country has recognised it. Puntland is an autonomous region also in northern Somalia currently at odds with the Somali federal government.
Last Thursday, the UK newspaper Daily Telegraph reported Israel’s Consul General to the Pacific Southwest, Israel Bachar, as saying that Palestinians in Gaza could be relocated to Puntland and Somaliland, and also Morocco.
It also quoted Yacob Mohamed Abdalla, Puntland’s deputy minister of information, as saying that the region would be happy to take in refugees from Gaza as long as they came voluntarily.
A former spokesman for Puntland authorities, Abdulahi Mohamed Jaha, reportedly said in a Facebook post that Gazans shared the Islamic faith with Puntlanders and would contribute to “modernising and development” of the desperately poor Somali region.
Jaha added that Puntland’s state in the world would “improve” and it would gain opportunities for “security and economic development” if it took in Gazans, according to the Telegraph.
However, Abdirahman Keelo, a legal researcher from Puntland, told Al-Araby Al-Jadeed that these claims were “just a pipedream”, given the situation in the territory, which suffers from extreme poverty and underdevelopment.
“This is crazy thinking and mad logic,” he said, adding that “forced displacement is forbidden under international humanitarian law and it’s clear that Washington during Trump’s second term is more irrational, with his contradictory statements.
“We can’t come to logical conclusions based on his statements, even if they come from him,” Keelo added.
Discussions regarding the expulsion of Gazans to regions of Somalia and Morocco began after Egypt and Jordan angrily rejected Trump’s plan.
Israel’s 15 month war on the Gaza Strip has utterly devastated the territory and killed at least 61,707 people, according to updated figures released by the Gaza health ministry.
