Lieberman: Peace based on trading ‘land for peace doomed to fail’

Israeli Defence Minister Avigdor Lieberman said yesterday that starting peace talks with the Palestinians must be based on learning lessons from the past, stressing that peace based on “trading land for peace is doomed to fail’, Ynet News reported.

Lieberman commented on the possible Middle East peace conference which was reported by the media.

“At the beginning of a new attempt for political negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians, it is worthwhile to learn from the past,” he wrote on his Facebook.

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“The first lesson,” he wrote, “is that every attempt to solve the conflict that is based on trading land for peace is doomed to fail.”

Instead of this principle, he suggested: “The only way to reach a sustainable agreement is to trade lands and population as part of a general agreement.”

 “It cannot be that a 100 per cent homogeneous Palestinian state will be established without one Jewish citizen while Israel stays a dual-citizen nation with 22 per cent Palestinians.”

He added: “There is no reason for Sheikh Raed Salah [head of the Islamic Movement in Israel], Ayman Odeh, Basel Ghattas or Hanin Zoabi [Arab MKs] to continue being Israeli citizens.”

The Palestinian Authority insists that any peace solution for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict must lead to the creation of two states.