Ex-Israeli Defense Minister Liberman suggests giving Gaza to Egypt, West Bank to Jordan

ANKARA

As Israel has rejected a number of UN resolutions directly concerning the modern state of Palestine, former Israeli Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman flouted a unique idea on Friday to completely erase the Palestinian state from the world map, suggesting that Egypt should control the Gaza Strip and Jordan should control the West Bank.

In an interview with the Jerusalem Post, Liberman, leader of the opposition Yisrael Beytenu Party, said the possibility of a two-state solution has vanished.

“We understand that this idea of a two-state solution (to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict) has died. It does not exist,” the former Israeli defense minister claimed.

"In the future, Egypt should control Gaza and Jordan should take charge of Area A of the West Bank and a small portion of Area B," he suggested.

Under the 1995 Oslo Accords between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, was divided into three areas: Area A, B, and C, with Area C fully under Israeli army control.

Liberman argued that a new approach is needed on this issue.

“We need another approach,” Liberman said, explaining that it is illogical to “do the same thing for many years and to expect different results.”

“All of Area A and a small portion of B” should be under Jordanian control through a confederation, while Israel should apply sovereignty to the remainder of Area B and all of Area C, he added.

He also said that “at the end of the day the Egyptians should take control... of the Gaza Strip as a mandate of the UN and the Arab League.”

From 1967 until 1989, the UN Security Council adopted 131 resolutions directly addressing the Arab-Israeli conflict, many of which concerned Palestinians. However, since 2012, several resolutions have been issued addressing the modern state of Palestine.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said at a press conference on Jan. 18 that he was against the establishment of a Palestinian state in any way after the Oct. 7 attacks.

Israel has killed more than 27,000 people in the Gaza Strip in response to the Oct. 7 cross-border offensive by Hamas, which took the lives of 1,200 people and took 240 as hostages. The military onslaught has caused mass displacement and destruction and created conditions for famine.

*Writing by Ikram Kouachi