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February 1, 2002/19 Shevat 5762, Vol. 54, No. 20
Some question Sharon's intifada strategy
GIL SEDAN
Jewish Telegraphic Agency
JERUSALEM - Just when Ariel Sharon seems prepared to give Yasser Arafat the coup de grƒce, the Israeli left stands in his way.
First came Knesset Speaker Avraham Burg, who said he is determined to speak before Palestinian legislators in Ramallah despite the fervent opposition of the Israeli right.
Then, last weekend, some 50 reserve soldiers and officers published an open letter declaring they would no longer serve in the West Bank and Gaza Strip and would not fight a "war for the peace of the settlements."
This comes after Israeli Prime Minister Sharon seemed to have gathered an unprecedented coalition of anti-Arafat forces, ranging from the settlers through Defense Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer all the way to President Bush.
That coalition made Sharon believe nothing could stand in his way to making Palestinian Authority President Arafat "irrelevant" - not only in the eyes of the Israeli government but also in the Palestinian, Arab and international context.
Sharon and Ben-Eliezer argued that there was no real lull in Palestinian terror. Pointing to the Karine A ship, captured Jan. 3 as it was transporting 50 tons of weapons to the Palestinian Authority, they argued that the apparent calm was only a cover for the Palestinians to prepare a new wave of attacks.
So, too, they seized on the exposure of a Hamas bomb factory in Nablus two weeks ago and intelligence reports that Hamas had made and deployed rockets close to the border between Israel and the West Bank, threatening Jerusalem and other cities in the heart of Israel.
That provided the justification for Israel's renewed wave of assassinations.
With military escalation seemingly imminent, however, criticism is growing of the way Sharon is handling the intifada. The most significant criticism came from the heart of the military establishment, when Deputy Defense Minister Dalia Rabin-Pelossof came out last week against the wisdom of killing Raed Karmi in Tulkarm. Karmi was a terror ringleader who boasted of killing Israelis, and Israeli officials said taking him out had saved untold lives. Yet his slaying also led to a renewed wave of suicide bombings and shootings that killed more Israelis.
Yossi Beilin, former justice minister and one of the architects of the Oslo accords, blamed Sharon for deliberately disrupting any potential dialogue because he lacked a political solution to the Palestinian conflict. Burg said, "We do not consider any alternative, except for the alternative of the attacker and the attacked."
Consequently, more and more Israelis are questioning the way the government handles the intifada.
Last weekend, the daily Yediot Achronot published a public opinion poll showing that though the right still enjoys a solid majority, 48 percent of the population sees a similarity between the situation in the West Bank and Gaza and the situation Israel faced in Lebanon, from which it eventually withdrew after years of Hezbollah attacks.
In addition, 58 percent of respondents oppose the destruction of the Palestinian Authority through the temporary reconquest of West Bank land. The public is split on the question of whether Sharon's government is heading toward all-out war with the Palestinians.
Sharon enjoys strong support from the Bush administration, however, as well as the loyalty of the Israeli military establishment.
As Israelis adjust to a situation in which massive terrorist attacks take place every few days, a new alignment of forces is emerging. Sharon seems to enjoy carte blanche for a policy of gradually eroding the Palestinian Authority.
Moreover, the Arab world seems unwilling to help Arafat with anything more than words.
Though so many players seem to have given up on Arafat, not all Israelis are ready to overthrow him. The most frequent complaint is that Sharon has no real plan for what would come after Arafat.
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