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| PM Ariel Sharon (AP file) |
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By Gary Rosenblatt
December 29, 2005
Reprinted with permission of The Jewish Week.
The Person of the Year 2005 in Jewish life is Ariel Sharon, hands down.
Even before the mild stroke he suffered this week brought new attention to the key role he plays in Israeli life, Sharon's importance was obvious. Whether or not you agree with him and his policies, it's hard to imagine any other man or woman in the Jewish world who has had a greater impact in the past 12 months on Israel, Jewish life and the vision of Zionism for the 21st century.
The Israeli prime minister's bold and controversial calculation to disengage Israeli troops and civilians from Gaza and four West Bank settlements; his ability to carry out the unilateral move without touching off a feared civil war; and his decision to bolt Likud, the political party he helped found, and start another in pursuit of a third term all promise to have a profound effect on the Jewish future in Israel and around the world.
Nearing the end of his long public career, Sharon, almost 78, embodies the Israel of its founders, a man of bold action - militarily and politically - both valiant and flawed, but deeply rooted in and committed to the land and people of the Jewish state.
As a legendary army figure who has fought in and been wounded in Israel's wars, he has been praised for his audacious battlefield heroics that reversed the tide of the 1973 Yom Kippur War and been reviled for overreaching during the 1982 Lebanon campaign. Advising Menachem Begin to extend that war in an effort to rid Israel of Yasir Arafat and the PLO, Sharon was blamed for his role in the Sabra and Shatilla massacres and forced from the defense ministry's top post in humiliation - only to rise again two decades later to confront, outmaneuver and outlast Arafat in a five-year, bloody terror war.
Elected prime minister over the incumbent, Ehud Barak, in early 2001 as the second intifada grew more deadly, Sharon practiced restraint - a new tactic for him - but gradually prevailed by employing simultaneously a blend of military, security and diplomatic initiatives. While striking at the leaders of the suicide bombing campaign and infiltrating their cells through intelligence agencies, Sharon also began to build a security barrier close to Israel's borders, concluding that negotiations with the Palestinian leadership was not possible now and that Israel needed to make unilateral decisions to ensure its future.
A key element in being able to put up the fence and send troops into Palestinian cities during the height of the war was Sharon's carefully constructed relationship with President Bush, which allowed him the latitude to do what he felt he needed to do without fearing American coercion.
Long known as "The Bulldozer" for his hawkish and bullying manner, Sharon is heralded now by supporters as a pragmatist, centrist and statesman while vilified by those on his right, including his former Likud colleagues, as a hypocrite, liar and even traitor for going back on his pledge not to displace the settlers he once championed or cede land to the Palestinians.
Among Sharon's tough decisions was to cast his diplomatic lot with President Bush, a move that permitted the prime minister to make military moves against the Palestinians without worrying about jeopardizing American support. But it also makes the Israeli leader vulnerable to American pressure on other fronts, as it did, for example, with the Gaza border agreement Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice pushed through last month involving Israel, Egypt and the Palestinian Authority. It places European Union monitors in the area, a move Israel agreed to with great reluctance.
The significance of Sharon's decision to disengage from Gaza and part of the West Bank cannot be overemphasized. It has changed the dynamics of the Israel-Palestinian equation, from imploding the Israeli political system to forcing the Palestinians to abandon for the foreseeable future the dream of a one-state solution (now that Israel has improved its demographic balance by ridding itself of responsibility for more than a million Arabs in Gaza).
Looking ahead, Sharon is the strong favorite to be re-elected in the national elections in March via his newly formed Kadima party. If so, the year 2006 may be known for two strong Sharon-driven initiatives, one domestic and one diplomatic.
Based on his deep frustration over the constraints the political system places on a prime minister - necessitating a constant struggle to keep a coalition together - there is a real chance Sharon will push for a much-needed reform of the electoral system to provide the prime minister with powers similar to that of an American president. That would be a major victory for all who support a more functional form of government and allow long-term planning in Israel to mean years, not weeks.
A third term for Sharon, who defeated Amram Mitzna of Labor in January 2003, could also mean a greater emphasis on Israeli unilateralism. With little hope of effective or progressive Palestinian Authority leadership, Sharon considers peace negotiations to be on permanent hold and will look toward other moves he feels will be best for Israel, not waiting for the Palestinians. (Ironically, this could include Israel recognizing the PA as a sovereign state, against the PA's wishes - part of "an inversion" of positions, noted by the Re'ut Institute, an Israeli-based consulting group advising government agencies. Such a move would place greater responsibility on the PA to attend to the needs of Arabs in the Gaza and West Bank.)
In any event, it is clear that Ariel Sharon is not only the man of the hour who has reframed Israeli politics, but the leader who has transformed the parameters and concepts of the Palestinian-Israel conflict for a long time to come. History will judge him not only for his military gains and humiliations, but for setting Israel on a political course based on a strategic pragmatism whose success or failure is yet unknown.
Views expressed by the author do not
necessarily reflect those of israelinsider.
 
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