The Jordan Valley, which runs from the Sea of Galilee down to the Dead Sea, is about 100 kilometres long. Around 80 percent of it runs through the occupied West Bank, and it also flanks the Israel-Jordan border.
Netanyahu has said Israel must maintain a security presence along the border in a peace deal with the Palestinians to ensure weapons are not smuggled into their state and to prevent a link-up with hostile military forces.
The Palestinians have rejected any Israeli security presence in their future state but have said they would be open to foreign peacekeepers.
The radio quoted Israeli sources as saying that Netanyahu agreed to the idea but demanded that the arrangement be for a longer period of time than the original US offer that Israel lease the border region with Jordan for seven years.
According to the report, Netanyahu said in closed talks that “seven years is not enough — an arrangement like this needs to last for dozens of years.”
The report also quoted a senior minister as saying that “anything less than a 99-year lease is not worth talking about.”
On Friday, the Arabic-language Al-Sharq Al-Awsat newspaper said that the US administration and Israel discussed the land rental proposal to overcome some obstacles that face a peaceful solution to the Middle East conflict.
The newspaper added that Israel would hire the land in East Jerusalem and the future Palestinian state’s eastern borders with Jordan for 40 or 99 years.
Daniel Hershkowitz, Israeli Minister of Science and Technology, dismissed the idea, even if it is for 99 years.
“If we agree to the offer, we will be broadcasting to the Palestinians that the land is actually theirs”, Hershkowitz, also chairman of far-right Habayit Hayehudi (Jewish Home), said. “I’m not the only one who thinks this way,” he added.
“Why do we need to lease land that belongs to us,” Hershkowitz questioned.
On Saturday, the Palestinian Authority rejected the US offer. Sa’eb Erekat, the chief Palestinian negotiator, said in a press statement that the “land of Palestine is not for rent.”
Erekat accused Israel of fueling debate on that issue as “trial balloons.”
The Palestinians have halted direct talks with Israel after the latter refused to extend a 10-month settlement construction moratorium that expired on Sept. 26.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said last week that the Palestinians “are ready to go back to the negotiations as soon as Israel stops settlement activities.”
Abbas told a news conference in Ramallah after meeting with Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit that he has “seven options” to respond to Israel’s expansion of settlements.
He did not reveal the options which are believed to include seeking an international recognition of a Palestinian statehood from the UN Security Council.
