- "...there is nothing in the slivers of leaks about
the [political] plan that Sharon can't grind into dust. He won't take down
settlements... If he removes one illegal outpost, his friends on the fringes
of the right know how to count: how many remain and how many were established
during the fake shows about removing a mobile home from a barren hilltop
here and there."
-
- The soothsayers trying to understand Ariel Sharon's new
political plan and how it will be born should make note of what actually
happened to send them to their crystal balls. It wasn't the casualties
on both sides. Nor was it a smartened-up initiative that was kept in reserve
for nearly three years until the moment was right. Nor the American pressure,
which collapsed, anyway, into their presidential election season. Sharon
once again tossed out his vague clauses only because his situation worsened.
-
- Such political egoism breaks Sharon's own records. Public
relations and spin are an irreproachable part of any leader's career.
-
- But not when the fate of the state hangs in the balance.
Not when its image advisers and advertising men need to whisper into the
prime minister's ear that it's time to "do something." And it's
not leadership, but the worst kind of deception, when Sharon drips moderate
announcements because that's what the polls of recent weeks dictate him
to do. Some good might have come out of that, nonetheless, if rising public
pressure, bad polls and other trouble inside the Likud were making Sharon
deviate from his misleading political path and head for a genuine agreement.
But even the four ex-Shin Bet chiefs, with the clubbing they gave him in
their joint interview, couldn't make him head that way.
-
- By all signs, his new promise does not justify any real
expectations. He made clear through some associates and apparently in conversations
with his partners, that he won't go so far as to drive the right out of
the government. Inside the party there is discomfort about his disturbed
status in Likud branches and on the street. Of course, that's not where
the support for a daring political move would come from. The trial balloon
Sharon floated is first of all an attempt to pave a bypass road around
troubles by going straight to the public as that same old good grandfather
from the days of the election campaign with a pocketful of surprising biscuits.
He puts off handing them out until the summer, to play with them as a lure
during the long wait. He hints to the right that there's nothing in his
pockets, and sends one of his winks to the left and center, where there
still are people who have not despaired of them. True, as has been his
wont, the prime minister is capable of stunning with surprise the most
orthodox of his followers. But he will never do it if the move will harm
his political base.
-
- And, indeed, there is nothing in the slivers of leaks
about the plan that Sharon can't grind into dust. He won't take down settlements.
He has no intention, he told the settler leaders this week, "to destroy
settlements in Yesha and give them to the enemy." If he does, indeed,
order the removal of one settlement, he will win political capital on his
left and American flanks from the ruckus the settlers make and without
him actually doing anything. If he removes one illegal outpost, his friends
on the fringes of the right know how to count: how many remain and how
many were established during the fake shows about removing a mobile home
from a barren hilltop here and there.
-
- Meanwhile, he'll earn the asset he most needs for his
personal needs - and his alone. Sharon will gain time, while the national
interest will be eroded the longer Sharon takes injury time in the irresponsible
game he is conducting.
-
- He'll go to Europe and try to sell his painful compromises.
He'll meet with Ahmed Qureia to say here he is, Sharon, doing more than
the Palestinian Authority for peace. He'll give one more chance to the
road map, which he smothered, he'll give it one more brave embrace. And
in the summer he'll look over at the American election campaign and Bush's
troubles and know he has another six months of quiet on the job.
-
- What more should the prime minister do or fail to do
to make the entire new show get put off as a trick? Nothing new. Just more
of the same, as Tommy Lapid strokes him from the left and the loyalists
of the Greater Land of Israel hold on from the right.
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- http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/365086.html
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