A day ahead of Israel's third election in a year, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pledged Sunday that if re-elected he would annex swathes of the occupied West Bank within weeks.
In an interview with Israeli public radio, Netanyahu said annexation of the Jordan Valley and other parts of the West Bank was his top priority among "four major immediate missions".
"That will happen within weeks, two months at the most, I hope," he said in the interview aired 24 hours before polls were scheduled to open.
"The joint US-Israeli mapping committee started work a week ago," he added.
Earlier on Saturday, Yisrael Beytenu Party Leader Avigdor Liberman said that Netanyahu informed Jordan that he would not go through with a campaign pledge to annex the Jordan Valley.
“I learned a few days ago that, despite all the talks on the annexation of the Jordan Valley, Netanyahu sent a message to Jordan’s King Abdullah II saying ‘Don't worry, these are just elections, there won’t be annexation’ - ", Lieberman said during a cultural event in Holon.
He affirmed that this information came from a “reliable source.”
Israeli media took Lieberman's statements with great importance, especially that he has leaked information about Israeli Mossad chief’s visit to Qatar last month.
Liberman also reiterated that Netanyahu “reached an agreement” with the head of Head of the left-wing Meretz-Gesher-Labor alliance MK Amir Peretz.
He said this agreement guarantees Peretz’s succession of Reuven Rivlin as Israel's President.
“A deal was closed in the past few days between Netanyahu and Peretz on the presidency matter.”
“We won’t join any government that is led by Netanyahu. We’d be happy to join a Likud government without Netanyahu,” he said.
Lieberman’s comments were made in light of leaked news on Israeli security agencies’ rejection of the Jordan Valley annexation, fearing it would anger Jordan and lead to a possible escalation in the West Bank.
However, Netanyahu's Likud party fired back in a statement, saying that Liberman's claim was a lie, and that “only Netanyahu will apply sovereignty to the Jordan Valley while Lieberman will support the Joint Arab List.”
US President Donald Trump's widely-criticized Middle East peace plan, unveiled in late January, gave the Jewish state a green light to annex the area and proposed a committee to set out the exact borders of the territory to be annexed.
Netanyahu listed his other priorities as signing an "historic" defense treaty with the United States and "eradicating the Iranian threat", without elaborating on his plan for Tehran.
He has repeatedly pledged to stop Tehran from developing a nuclear weapon and has not ruled out the use of force.
He has also acted to roll back Iranian and allied forces active in neighboring Syria.
Israel routinely fires missiles at what it says are Iranian targets in Syria, where elite Iranian forces and allied militia play a key role in the country's conflict.
Netanyahu on Sunday said that his fourth "immediate" goal if he wins another term -- despite facing trial on multiple corruption charges -- would be major economic reform to bring down Israel's high cost of living.
After inconclusive elections in April and September, the latest opinion polls put the right-wing Netanyahu and his centrist rival Benny Gantz neck and neck in Monday's vote.
