Selected published opinions
- Some of my opinion articles in EL PAIS (English translation)
Property Rights in Gaza
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EL PAIS, October 6, 2025
Gaza has become hell and there is no room for partisan or semantic arguments (although I can't find a better description than "genocide"). As has been said in these pages, this explains the immediate widespread support for Trump and Netanyahu's Peace Plan. “What is needed is to stop the killing”, read the editorial title of EL PAÍS of October 1st. True, but in any peace agreement, it is necessary to separate: what is clearly said (the commitment), what is ambiguously said (hence, non credible),an d what is not said. For example, the ambiguous point 19 on the future Palestinian state has already been dismissed by Netanyahu And, regarding the absences, the most noticeable is that of the other party, as every peace agreement requires—neither Hamas, which is defeated, nor the Palestinian Authority, which role is delayed. But there is another absence that is almost as important.
To whom the Gaza Strip will belong? Normally, territorial peace not only resolves the war, but also determines who is sovereign over each territory and, consequently, how ownership is restored in each territory. Unfortunately, this is not the case in the Gaza Strip, and we are not talking about just any territory, but rather of a "gold mine," as Trump and Netanyahu's ministers like to call it.
I ask ChatGPT5 about “Gaza’s property rights,” and he immediately replies that “it’s a sensitive issue.” He concludes his brief report with this summary: “The property regime in Gaza reflects more than a century of overlapping legal frameworks and unresolved political conflicts. The current system is shaped by Ottoman, British, Egyptian, Israeli, and Palestinian laws, aggravated by forced displacement and repeated wars. Around 70% of Gaza’s 2.2 million inhabitants [ before the genocide] are refugees whose original properties are located in present-day Israel, governed by Israel’s Absentee Property Law (1950), which prevents their restitution or return.” The remaining inhabitants who could reclaim their properties face a very difficult, if not impossible, challenge. The registry established by the Palestinian Authority in the 1990s is of dubious value. Under international humanitarian law, Gaza remains “occupied” by Israel. That is to say, property rights are protected by the Fourth Geneva Convention, which prohibits the destruction/confiscation of private property except when there is a military necessity. In short, in the militarily destroyed Gaza Strip, property rights are part of its ruins.
It is in this context that the "Plan for Peace" should be reread: 3. Gaza will be rebuilt for the benefit of the people of Gaza, who have suffered more than enough. The fine words with which it ends cannot hide the ambiguity of what it says. Will ownership of the Gaza Strip be given to the people of Gaza? 9. Gaza will be governed by a temporary transitional government [to be redundant] of a technocratic and apolitical Palestinian committee, responsible for the day-to-day management of public services and municipalities of the population of Gaza…with oversight by…the “Peace Board” chaired by Donald J. Trump…This body will handle funding for the development of Gaza until the Palestinian Authority has completed its reform program.” Not a word about who and how property in Gaza will be reestablished and protected, which paves the way for the “gold mine” to be sold by the time the Palestinian Authority’s turn comes.
Let’s suppose I’m wrong and that the technocratic and apolitical Palestinian committee, aside from the logistics, also reestablishes property in Gaza according to the Palestinian Authority registry, which turns out to be up to date and can identify the various properties among the ruins and their owners (survivors, relatives of the dead, etc.), as well as the collective property that the committee will temporarily manage until the Palestinian Authority does so. How long will it take for the large real estate companies to make offers, practically impossible to refuse, to private owners (and bribe the managers of public property)? Thus, real estate speculation could end what the genocide has not ended: the final diaspora of the Palestinian people.
Although perhaps real estate speculation will not be necessary. It is only necessary that, in the face of the chaotic existing property laws, the "Peace Board," with its panel of experts who have contributed to the birth of some of the prosperous, miraculous, modern cities of the Middle East (10), decide that the beautiful shore of the Eastern Mediterranean deserves an equally beautiful and simple law: the "Law of the Sea," according to which whoever saves a boat from sinking, becomes the owner of the boat. Precisely the "Peace Board," chaired by Trump, is designed to save Gaza from total destruction.
[ES Link]