Stressing the futility of land-for-peace negotiations with the PA, Liberman suggested a population swap, adding that anti-Israel Knesset members should not remain citizens of Israel.
“At the dawn of a new attempt at peace negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians, we must take lessons from the past, and the first lesson is that any attempt to solve the Palestinian issue based on land for peace is destined for failure. The only way to reach a sustainable agreement is through a land and population exchange as part of a larger regional deal,” Israeli Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman stated on his Facebook page Monday.
“It cannot be that a homogenous Palestinian state will be established with zero Jews and a population that is 100 percent Palestinian, while Israel would be binational, with 22% Palestinians,” he continued, in apparent reference to statements by senior Palestinian officials, including PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, that Jewish residents of Judea and Samaria could not live in “Palestine.”
In a video released in September, which went viral, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu charged that “the Palestinian leadership actually demands a Palestinian state with one precondition: No Jews. There’s a phrase for that: It’s called ethnic cleansing.”
In his Facebook statement, Liberman added that “there’s no reason why Sheikh Raed Salah, Ayman Odeh, Basel Ghattas or Hanin Zoabi should continue to be citizens of Israel.” Salah heads the outlawed Islamic Movement’s northern branch in Israel. The other three, members of the Knesset’s Arab Joint List, have acted against the interests of the State of Israel in apparent support for Palestinian terrorists.
Liberman visited US Vice-President Mike Pence at the White House last week and expressed appreciation for the Trump administration’s friendship to Israel.
