the below are verbatim quotations.
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Sharon's True 'Judeo-Nazi'
Self-Proclaimed 'War Criminal' Self
"The Dirty Work of Zionism is not Yet Finished"
"You can call me anything you like. Call me a monster or a murderer...
Better a live Judeo-Nazi than a dead saint... Even if you prove to me
that the present war in Lebanon is a dirty immoral war, I don't care...
We shall start another war, kill and destroy more and more, until they
will have had enough... Let them tremble, let them call us a mad state.
Let them understand that we are a wild country, dangerous to our
surroundings, not normal, that we might go crazy if one of our children
is murdered, just one! If anyone even raises his hand against us we'll
take away half his land and burn the other half, including the oil.
We might use nuclear arms... Even today I am willing to volunteer to
do the dirty work for Israel, to kill as many Arabs as necessary, to
deport them, to expel and burn them, to have everyone hate us....
And I don't mind if after the job is done you put me in front of a
Nuremberg Trial and then jail me for life. Hang me if you want, as
a war criminal... What you don't understand is that the dirty work
of Zionism is not finished yet, far from it."
Ariel Sharon, December 1982
"Sharon was a killer obsessed with hatred of Palestinians. I
had promised Arafat that his people would not get any harm.
Sharon, however, ignored this commitment entirely. Sharon's
word is worth nil."
Ambassador Philip Habib
President Ronald Reagan's Special Middle East Envoy in 1982
MID-EAST REALITIES - MER - www.MiddleEast.Org - Washington, DC - 4/17/2002:
Just a few months after the terrible massacres of Palestinians in the refugee camps near Beirut in 1982 Ariel Sharon gave an interview to a famous Israeli journalist; and pressed by the tensions of the moment and the condemnation of much of the world Sharon revealed his true self. The U.S. was complicitous and responsible for what happened then, just as it is now. Back then the U.S. was also fronting for the Israelis and giving false promises to the Palestinians just as it is doing today. Back then it was Ambassador Philip Habib representing President Ronald Reagan; now it is Colin Powell representing President George W. Bush.
SHARON'S BRUTAL PHILOSOPHY
By Holger Jensen*
(Minneapolis Star-Tribune, April 12) - Nicknamed "The Bulldozer," Israel's prime minister is a soldier-politician whose career has been dogged by persistent accusations of war crimes.
But what kind of man is Secretary of State Colin Powell trying to persuade to make peace with the Palestinians?
At 74, Sharon may be the last Israeli leader who fought for the Haganah, politely described as part of the "underground" that helped create the Jewish state in 1948.
Often overlooked is that the Haganah and its offshoots, Irgun Zvai Leumi and the Stern Gang, once were considered terrorist organizations that bombed Arab bus stops, attacked Arab villages and killed quite a few Britons in fighting to end the British Mandate of Palestine.
It also should be noted that two other former prime ministers of Israel, Menachem Begin and Yitzhak Shamir, were leaders of the Irgun and the Stern Gang respectively. Among the atrocities these groups were responsible for was bombing the King David Hotel and massacring 250 Arab villagers in Deir Yassin.
So it can safely be said that some of Israel's earliest patriots were no different from the Palestinians they call terrorists today.
The Haganah, which Sharon joined at age 14, formed the nucleus of Israel's new army when the Jewish state came into being, and the Israeli Defense Force, as it is called, is now the world's fourth-strongest military machine.
Besides an awesome array of American-supplied weapons, it has the largest and most sophisticated nuclear arsenal outside the five declared nuclear powers - the United States, Russia, China, France and Britain - estimated at up to 2,000 warheads. These include nuclear artillery shells and nuclear-tipped medium-range
ballistic missiles (the Jericho 1 and 2).
The man who now controls those nukes has devoted his entire life to Israel's security - and ruthlessly so.
Sharon earned a bloody reputation in the 1950s when he led retaliatory attacks against Jordanian villages
accused of harboring Palestinians who mounted cross-border raids on Israel. After the 1967 war, when Israel
occupied the West Bank and Gaza Strip, Sharon pursued a ruthless hunt for guerrillas that destroyed hundreds
of Palestinian homes.
When Israel invaded Lebanon in 1982, Sharon was held indirectly responsible for a massacre of Palestinian
refugees by Israel's Christian Phalange allies. Eyewitness accounts by journalists and relief workers in the
Sabra and Shatilla refugee camps, including a Dutch doctor and a Jewish American nurse, said Israeli army
bulldozers helped dig mass graves for more than 800 dead.
That cost Sharon his job as Israel's defense minister and is the basis of war crimes charges filed by 29 survivors
in a Belgian court.
During the Lebanese invasion, Sharon gave a revealing interview to Amos Oz, a leading Israeli author, in which
he bluntly explained his military doctrine and railed against pacifist Jews who thought he was being too tough.
It was published in the daily Davar on Dec. 17, 1982. Excerpts:
"You can call me anything you like. Call me a monster or a murderer. ... Better a live Judeo-Nazi than a dead
saint.
"Even if you prove to me that the present war in Lebanon is a dirty immoral war, I don't care. Even if Galilee is
shelled again by Katyushas in a year's time, I don't really care. We shall start another war, kill and destroy more
and more, until they will have had enough.
"Let them tremble, let them call us a mad state. Let them understand that we are a wild country, dangerous to
our surroundings, not normal, that we might go crazy if one of our children is murdered, just one! If anyone even
raises his hand against us we'll take away half his land and burn the other half, including the oil. We might use
nuclear arms.
"Even today I am willing to volunteer to do the dirty work for Israel, to kill as many Arabs as necessary, to deport
them, to expel and burn them, to have everyone hate us. ... And I don't mind if after the job is done you put me
in front of a Nuremberg Trial and then jail me for life. Hang me if you want, as a war criminal.
"What you don't understand is that the dirty work of Zionism is not finished yet, far from it."
Twenty years later, Sharon is still applying that brutal philosophy to a captive West Bank. And he is so obsessed with destroying Israel's enemies he won't listen to friends, including the President of the United States.
* Holger Jensen is international editor of the Rocky Mountain News.
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