A top aide of US President Donald Trump on Wednesday defended his proposal for the US to take over war-ruined Gaza and create a “Riviera of the Middle East” after relocating Palestinians elsewhere.

Trump drew rebukes on Wednesday from world powers Russia, China, and Germany for his proposal. Similarly, regional heavyweight Saudi Arabia rejected the proposal outright.

Barely two weeks into his second return to the White House, Trump altered decades of US policy on Tuesday with a worded announcement saying he envisioned building a resort where international communities could live in harmony after nearly 16 months of Israeli bombardment devastated the coastal enclave and killed more than 47,000 people.

At a White House briefing on Wednesday, Trump’s press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, applauded his principal’s Gaza proposal as historic and outside-the-box thinking, stressing that the president had not made a commitment to putting boots on the ground in the Palestinian enclave.

Leavitt, at the same time, backed away from Trump’s earlier assertion that Gazans needed to be permanently resettled in neighbouring countries, saying instead that they should be temporarily relocated for the rebuilding process.

It was not clear whether Trump would go ahead with his proposal or was simply taking an extreme position as a bargaining strategy, as he has done on other issues in the past.