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Michael Anbar , PhD, is a professor in the School of Medicine at the University of Buffalo. Formerly a professor at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, he is the author of , published by iUniverse.
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By Michael Anbar
August 19, 2002
Ariel Sharon is a political leader many people like to hate. The Prime Minister of Israel is being demonized. He is the object of bitter hatred by Arabs, Frenchmen, Norwegians, Dutchmen, Belgians, Englishmen, some Americans, and even by some Israeli and American Jews. Why? What are the reasons for this animosity?
I can understand the hatred of the Arabs. As a military commander Ariel Sharon fought Arab terrorism for almost fifty years -- since 1953, when he created Unit 101, the "Special Forces" anti-terrorist detachment. In 1956 he embarrassed the Egyptian army when he and his paratroopers captured the Mitla Pass behind their lines. In 1967 he was one of the commanders that defeated the Egyptian army in the Six Days War. Three years later he destroyed the Arab terrorist bases in the Gaza Strip. But his leadership and strategic ability were truly manifested in the Yom Kippur War of 1973. He then changed dramatically the outcome of that war from an incipient Israeli defeat to a glorious victory, encircling the Egyptian Third Army, crossing the Suez Canal and threatening to enter Cairo. Thus Sharon brought the third attempt of Egypt to exterminate the Jewish state to a spectacular humiliating end. This crushing defeat, which severely damaged Arab self-image, resulted in the demonization of Sharon, who now symbolizes for Arabs "evil" undefeatable Jewish military might.
In 1977 when he was Minister of Agriculture in Menachem Begin's cabinet, Sharon advocated and coordinated the establishment of Israeli villages and towns in the territories conquered from Egypt and Jordan in the 1967 war. This move was prompted by the 1973 Arab treacherous surprise attack. Sharon's goal was to increase the strategic depth of the State of Israel in order to discourage future Arab attacks, especially from Syria and/or Iraq.
In 1982 when he was Minister of Defense, Sharon coordinated the Israeli incursion into Lebanon. He achieved his military objective of ousting Arafat and his terrorist gang from that country. This was, however, a politically costly victory, because Sharon failed to achieve his major political objective of reaching a peace treaty with a stable Lebanese government. On the contrary, the invasion of Syria that followed the U.S. intervention in the Lebanon war made Lebanon a Syrian protectorate. Next there was the occurrence of the notorious massacre of many hundreds of Palestinians in the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps by Christian militia fighters, taking revenge for the assassination of their leader; this took place in a territory that was under Israeli military control. This led to Sharon's resignation from the government in 1983, having been accused of not preventing the unlawful behavior of the Lebanese Christian militia. The Arabs were now glad to find a good excuse to demonize Sharon without admitting their humiliating defeats.
Having been elected Prime Minister in 2001 with a 62.4% majority, (probably more than 75% majority of Jewish voters), Sharon pursues his uncompromising war against Arab terrorism as a no-nonsense enemy of Al-Fatah and its Islamist terrorist allies. Ariel Sharon is not a populist. He is a typical farmer-soldier and in no way is he a smooth politician. He has been popular among his troops but not for his eloquent speeches. His election by such an overwhelming majority is testimony to the maturity of the Israeli voting public, which understood that what they need in these trying times is a tough, determined leader and not a smooth, manipulative diplomat.
Arab hatred of Sharon is a given. Understandably, Sharon is not endeared to Arab hearts in the same manner that the Japanese hated General McArthur and Admiral Nimitz, or the hatred of the Germans for Winston Churchill and Stalin, who were responsible for many hundreds of thousands of German casualties, including many civilians. But what about the Europeans and many liberal Americans?
It makes no sense to assume that they hate Sharon because of Sabra and Shatila because they do not show such hatred to General Tommy Franks who, unlike Sharon, has given direct orders that led to the death of numerous innocent civilians in "collateral damage" in Afghanistan. They do not hate President Clinton who ordered the bombing of Belgrade and other cities in Serbia, causing the death of numerous innocent civilians. (Even the European liberals do not accuse Sharon of ordering the attack on those refugee camps). Certain European and American liberal pacifists hate all ranking military officers because they order to "kill people." Even if those people are blood-thirsty enemies who do not hesitate to murder indiscriminately anyone who does not faithfully follow their "noble" cause; the same liberals might thus become victims of the very terrorists they are trying to "understand" and defend. It is hard to believe, however, that European politics are controlled by such pacifists.
Anther prevailing explanation of European hate for Sharon is that the Europeans are known to be sympathetic to the underdog (as are many Jews) and in the Arab-Israeli conflict the Arabs have managed to portray themselves as underdogs. Thus Sharon appears to symbolize the monster that mercilessly oppresses those poor Arabs. However, this explanation does not hold remembering that there was no similar outrage in Europe when the Nigerian Muslims actually killed tens of thousands of Christian Ibo in the short lived Republic of Biafra. Nor has there been much outrage when the Arab Sudanese murder and enslave black non-Muslim Sudanese by the thousands in Southern Sudan. There also was no significant outrage in Europe when Muslim Idi Amin massacred some 300,000 non-Muslim Ugandans in the early seventies. Coming to the Middle East, there was no outrage in Europe when Saddam Hussein killed Kurds by the thousands or when Hafez Al-Assad murdered thousands of citizens in Aleppo. Is this just a coincidence that the supposed compassion of Europe for oppressed and suffering underdogs ceases to exist when the perpetrators are Muslims?
Assuming that the Europeans are not duped by Arab propaganda (Europe is too sophisticated for that), we are left with just two possibilities: One, that the Europeans are doing the bidding for the Arabs because of the political clout of their growing Muslim minorities or because they wish to please the Arabs for purely pragmatic material reasons. Jacques Chirac's refusal to declare that the Hizbullah is a terrorist organization, in spite of its flagrant terrorist activities, including inciting and equipping Palestinian terrorists, is typical of European political hypocrisy.
Alternatively, Sharon is despised because he is a Jew who repeatedly defeated the enemies of a Jewish state. From a European perspective Jews are supposed to be humble, oppressed losers and not uncompromising victors. Like primitive tribesmen or Medieval Christians, Europeans may assume that if they see a person doing the unexpected, he must be using witchcraft - he must be evil. Thus all Jewish Israelis must be evil and should be shunned and boycotted. It may also be just deep-rooted anti-Semitism that uses Sharon as a symbol to justify hatred of Jews. Is it a coincidence that the Norwegians, who have collaborated with the Nazis and handed over their Jewish fellow citizens to be slaughtered in Auschwitz, spearhead the European anti-Sharon, anti-Israeli campaign?
Even harder to understand is the emotional hatred of many Israeli leftists for Sharon. True, Sharon was one of the architects of the rightist Likud party and is currently its leader. But I do not think that anyone on the Israeli right hated David Ben Gurion, Levi Eshkol, Yitzhak Rabin (notwithstanding his assassination by an extremist zealot, who hated Rabin's policy, not him personally) or Ehud Barak (who offered the Arabs more concessions than Rabin would ever offer). Also, on the Israeli left, I think, nobody emotionally hated Menahem Begin or even the stubborn, grim Yitzhak Shamir. So what is the reason for the deep despise of Sharon I saw in Israel as well as among "liberal" American Jews? Are they victims of Arab propaganda? Do they wish to identify themselves with the European socialists, who reportedly support them financially? But then if the motivation of the Europeans is sheer or hidden anti-Semitism - is not the knee-jerk response of those Israeli Sharon-haters intrinsically suicidal?
The European, American and Israeli peace-loving liberals do not realize that the alternatives to Sharon's tough but thoughtfully restrained policy would only reduce the chances for peace. This is obviously true if Sharon was replaced by a more radical rightist politician. But it is also true if his replacement would be a politician left of Center, (say, Amram Mitzna) who advocates extensive concessions to the Arabs. That would encourage the militant Arabs to maintain the terror to gain more ground (Israel will never fully satisfy those Arabs as long as it continues to exist), and would enable a far more radical, non-compromising right wing party to gain control of the Israeli government.
The Arab Israeli conflict is not local but regional, with some global ramification. Without a change in the leadership in Baghdad and Teheran, and possibly also in Riyadh and Cairo, there will no lasting peace for the Jewish state. The scope of Israeli policy must, therefore, encompass much more than the dealings with an Arab leadership in Ramallah. Sharon's emphasis on maintaining an amiable association with an ideologically related U.S. Administration seems the most effective way to achieve peace and security for the State of Israel in the long run. "Liberal" politicians in Europe, in the U.S. and also in Israel, who hate the idea that the policy of a conservative Administration in Washington might be more effective then their own in maintaining world prosperity, seem to project that hate on Ariel Sharon.
Ariel Sharon should have been admired in Israel as a brilliant commander who in 1973 may have saved the country and probably the Jewish nation from a catastrophic defeat. That defeat would have resulted in the massacre of tens if not hundreds of thousands of Israeli Jews (remember the 1929 massacres in Jerusalem and Hebron) and in the final exile of Jews from their ancient homeland. Sharon's triumph over Egypt has led to the peace treaty with that country seven years later. As we have learned in history, the route to peace is a decisive victory. Unfortunately, Sharon is now under internal and external pressures that prevent him from using the same strategy with the Palestinian Arabs. However, his persistent current policy may convince the Arabs in Ramallah and Gaza that they have no chance to win the present war of attrition and accept reality, just as the Egyptian did in 1979.
Sharon struggles now with petty internal politics. This must be a distasteful experience. I believe that Ariel Sharon fully appreciates his historical role as preserver of the Jewish people. This is what keeps him going. Otherwise, he would have retired to his ranch years ago. He now risks the legacy of the greatest commander of the Jewish state to fulfill a far greater historical mission - securing the long-term survival of the Jewish nation.
Views expressed by the author do not
necessarily reflect those of israelinsider.
 
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