Land Exchange Quotes

At Camp David in 2000, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak offered the Palestinian leader Yasir Arafat 94 percent of the West Bank; ten years later, Ehud Olmert offered Abbas 93.6 percent with a one-to-one land swap.

Western concepts of ownership and privatization came in and clashed with that. So land began to be exchanged.

We have received the talk of our father the President of the United States, by the hands of our brothers the commissioners on the part of the United States. We find it is the wish of our father to exchange lands with us, lying on the west side of the Mississippi river, which we are very sorry to hear, as we never had a thought of exchanging our land for any others, as we think that we would not a country that would suit us as well as this we now occupy, it being the land of our forefathers, if we should exchange our lands for anu other, gearing the consequences may be similar to transplanting an old tree, which would wither and die away, and we are fearful we would come to the same. We want you, our brothers, to take our talk. We have no lands to exchange for any other. We wish our father to extend his protection to us here, as he proposes to do on the west of the Mississippi, as we apprehend we would, in a few years, experience the same difficulties in any other section of the country that might be suitable to us west of the Mississippi. Friends and brothers; we know that our white brothers are crowding upon us daily, which we know is not just. We further consider that there are a number of nations west of the Mississippi that have been enemies to us as well as our white brothers. It would be as much impossible to unite us with them as it would be to unite oil and water, and we have every reason to believe that those tribes that have left their country are not well satisfied; and if that should be the case, we are fearful that those tribes will take satisfaction of us for injuries done by us as well as our white brothers. We are a small tribe, and unable to defend our rights in any country. Our father the President wishes that we should come under the laws of the United States; we are a people that are not enlightened, and we cannot consent to be under your Government. If we should consent, we should be like unto young corn growing and met with a drought that would kill it all.

Israel will not discuss a peace involving the concession of any piece of territory. The neighboring states do not deserve an inch of Israel's land. . . . We are ready for exchange for peace.

Perhaps areas of Israel where current large Palestinian populations and demographic realities exist could be exchanged for Israeli expansion into the West Bank to include most of East Jerusalem.

The borders of Israel and an independent Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps. Each state needs secure and recognized borders, and there must be robust provisions that safeguard Israel's security.

We must give up Arab neighborhoods in Jerusalem and return to the core of the territory that is the State of Israel prior to 1967, with minor corrections dictated by the reality created since then.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netyanahu made it real clear. They're willing to be generous on some other concessions but not on the border issue. And I don't blame him.

As for now, we must not forget who would have to exchange the land? those villages which live more than others on irrigation, on orange and fruit plantations, in houses built near water wells and pumping stations, on livestock and property and easy access to markets.

To promote this disposition to exchange lands which they [the Indians] have to spare and we want, for necessaries which we have to spare and they want, we shall push our trading houses, and be glad to see the good and influential individuals among them in debt; because we observe that when these debts get beyond what the individuals can pay, they become willing to lop them off by a cession of lands.

Any negotiation on the basis of land for peace is a fatal mistake.

For several weeks, I have been the subject of leaked stories, conjecture, and false attacks about a land exchange. None of them bear any resemblance to the truth, including the rumor that I am planning on resigning.