Whatever one thinks about Ariel Sharon, and there are a lot of things to think, he certainly ranks among the greatest political figures of our age. Says Tarik Kafala of BBC News:
Like him or loathe him, the Israeli prime minister is a political colossus for Israelis. He has been at the centre of Israeli political life since the state's creation.
A controversial figure throughout his career, he was once forced from government over the massacres by Christian militiamen of Palestinians in the refugee camps around Beirut in 1982.
But he is also currently the only Middle Eastern leader with anything like a plan that might bring about a peace settlement between the Palestinians and Israelis.
He was an important Israeli general, and a founder of the Likud party, the (relatively) right of center party in Israel. He became Prime Minister in 2001 at the head of Likud, and later engineered a radical solution to the Palestinian problem.
His policy is often misunderstood. It rested, as I see it, on two principles. One was that Israel had to withdraw from most of the occupied territories, and allow the Palestinians to make their own way toward a state there. The second was that the Palestinian leadership, as it now exists, simply could not be a reliable partner in any negotiations. It is too corrupt and disorganized to make peace, even if it were willing to do so. Which it isn't. So Sharon resolved to unilaterally withdraw from most of the West Bank and Gaza, and build a wall between these territories and Israel that would allow the Israelis to isolate those territories from Israel, until such time as a reliable Palestinian government might emerge. This was a policy of genius and daring, and if anything promises a resolution, this does.
But Sharon found that his Likud party was not a viable instrument with which to implement his policy. Two many of its vital coalition partners were committed to a greater Israel. There was no way he could use Likud to build majority support for withdrawal. Nor could he turn to Labor, given his history. So he left Likud and formed a new, centrist party, Kadima. The Israelis go to the polls in March, and until now Kadima appeared likely to win enough seats in the Knesset for Sharon to form a coalition government.
With Sharon out of the picture, it is unclear whether he leaves behind anyone who is capable of leading his new party to an electoral victory, or continuing his policy. This is the sort of accident that leads some people, Machiavelli observed, to believe that fortune legislates everything.
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