Lieberman launches reward-and-punishment Palestinian program

"We will implement a differential policy in Judea and Samaria," said Avigdor Lieberman at a news conference called in Tel Aviv to Wednesday to unveil his program for West Bank Palestinians. "Its purpose is to continue to give benefits to those who desire to co-exist with us, and make life difficult for those who seek to harm Jews and opt for terror." 

A key element of the new plan is to engage in dialogue with the Palestinian public and its representative figures, while sidestepping the Palestinian Authority and its chairman, Mahmoud Abbas, whom he called “an obstacle to peace,” and boycotting Hamas.

Palestinian districts would henceforth be divided into “green” areas (clean of terrorists) – the largest – and smaller strips of "yellow" and "red" – mostly in the south and Hebron – with an active terrorist presence.

The former would receive benefits – a hospital for Beit Sahour, an industrial zone for Nablus, a soccer field for Kfar Bida, infrastructure development in Qalqilya, Hableh and Itzbat Tabib and an economic corridor connecting Jericho to Jordan.

Areas where terrorism is rifle will suffer expanded IDF activity, home demolitions, arrests, raids, confiscations of assets and property, and tough action against illegal construction.

Lieberman stressed that all parts of is program had been coordinated with Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu.

The defense minister said NIS10 million (app.$3.5m) would be spent on establishing a news website in Arabic under the management of the Coordinator for Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT).

.Lieberman said he was against returning the bodies of dead terrorists to their families. But the Attorney General said later that there was no security compulsion to hold them back.