Between the Lines

I came across an interview recently in Ivanka Trump spoke with visible enthusiasm about developing Sazan Island, off the Albanian coast. She described it the way people describe a discovery — an empty canvas, waiting. Entirely unencumbered by the inconvenient fact that the island already exists, with its own history, ecology, and meaning.

She described it the way people describe a discovery — an empty canvas, waiting. Romantic. Visionary. She even placed it “in the middle of the Mediterranean.” It is not. Sazan sits at the entrance to the Bay of Vlorë, where the Adriatic and the Ionian Seas meet. A small geographical error, perhaps. But in Europe, where every sea, every gulf, every stretch of coastline carries its own history and identity, that kind of casual imprecision tends to land badly. It signals something: that the place matters less than the project.

The project in question — backed by Jared Kushner, with $4 billion in investment envisioned — would bring villas, hotels, and residences for up to 10,000 guests to what was, until recently, protected land. Albanians have taken to the streets in protest. That’s worth sitting with for a moment.

Their anger is not simply about one island. Albania’s coastline has been gradually surrendered to concrete for years. Property costs in Tirana have roughly tripled, placing ownership out of reach for most citizens. And now this: a foreign-backed megaproject on sovereign territory, fast-tracked through a special parliamentary law even as the anti-corruption judiciary has opened an investigation involving four individuals, including a sitting minister. The law, apparently, will not wait for the courts.

Prime Minister Rama is framing it as a serious development opportunity. Perhaps it is. Investment and jobs are real considerations. But they are not the whole story, and the people in the streets seem to understand that clearly enough.

The geopolitical context adds another layer. Albania is a NATO member, and American interest in the country mixes economic ambition with regional influence. That’s not inherently wrong. What becomes corrosive is when the calculus treats a country’s landscape — and its citizens’ objections — as variables to be managed rather than voices to be heard.

Europe is not a collection of underdeveloped opportunities waiting for outside vision. It is home. Its landscapes carry memory, identity, and meaning that don’t appear on investment prospectuses. When someone describes an inhabited, ecologically significant island as an empty canvas, what they are really revealing is the limits of their own frame of reference.

Not every beautiful place needs to become a luxury resort. And not every protest is an obstacle. Sometimes it is precisely the point.