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Israel Beitanu Chairman Avigdor Lieberman visiting illegal settlement where he was heckled by a settler (Flash90)
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| By Israel Insider staff October 10, 2007 |
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Right wing MKs today slammed Israel Beitanu Chairman Avigdor Lieberman for endorsing Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's proposal to hand over Arab neighborhoods in Jerusalem to the Palestinian Authority. Lieberman contended that he was not proposing land concessions, but was adhering to his original platform for population exchange.
The chairman of Israel Beitanu said that "anyone with an IQ above zero" knew that Arab neighborhoods in Jerusalem were only added to the city for political reasons, the Jerusalem Post reported. Therefore, Lieberman continued, there was no reason to retain them.
"We are ready to exchange Anata and Shuafat for Givat Ze'ev and Gush Etzion. Their only connection to Israel is that they come for NIS 11 billion in national insurance while the taxes collected from them is a fraction of that," the paper quoted Lieberman as saying.
"It's wrong to fix the Palestinian problem without addressing the Israeli Arab problem," Lieberman continued, adding that the Jewish people did not pray to return to Anata, Shuafat or Um-El-Fahm.
Likud, which had been courting Israel Beitanu in hopes of running together for the next Knesset, announced that the party is no longer interested in such cooperation following Lieberman's remarks.
"For us to run together in the future, he would have to vow to oppose dividing Jerusalem, and that's apparently not going to happen," a senior Likud source said. "He crossed a line that cannot be crossed and we are shocked by the way he has zigzagged between Right and Left."
Likud's faction chairman, Gideon Sa'ar stressed his party's opposition to Lieberman's proposal, citing security grounds.
"Lieberman's views are mistaken and dangerous," Sa'ar said. "There are Arab neighborhoods in Lod, Ramle, Acre and Jaffa. Giving up Arab neighborhoods in Jerusalem would transform the city from Israel's capital to the terror capital of the Middle East."
Meanwhile Lieberman continued to defend his position: "Land concessions will bring neither peace nor security. The conflict between us and the Palestinians is not territorial. We are ready to exchange territories and people," Ynet quoted him as saying.
However other right-wing MKs joined the chorus of criticism against Lieberman, dismissing his population-swap argument.
"He is shaming the Right," National Religious Party Chairman MK Zevulun Orlev said, "he can continue telling us that he was referring only to land-swapping until the cows come home, but in actuality he and his fellow party members support Ramon's plan for the division of Jerusalem."
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