Background / Sharon's Trump card: The campaign of his life
By Bradley Burston, Haaretz Correspondent
Never before has an Israeli prime minister been likened to Donald Trump.
Then again, never before has an Israeli prime minister sacked or spurred the resignation of 10 cabinet ministers in less than half a year - and stayed in power.
In a reference to Trump's watch-it-even-if-you-loathe-it reality program "The Apprentice," a front-page Thursday newspaper analysis of Sharon's handling of a defeat over the budget was headlined "You're Fired!"
In his scramble to forge a Disengagement Government, a coalition capable of leaving Gaza before Sharon leaves office, Sharon has set a new record for Israeli chief executives.
Since June, on the eve of a vaguely worded cabinet endorsement of the disengagement proposal, Sharon has presided over the angry, defiant, and/or tactical exit of cabinet ministers from the far-right National Union, the settler-driven National Religious Party, and even his own Likud.
Late on Wednesday, Sharon's shrinking coalition suffered its most extensive hemorrhage yet, as the pro-"Netanyomics," pro-disengagement, anti-Haredi Shinui joined in a Knesset rout of the government's 2005 state budget proposal.
But for a man ostensibly drubbed hours before in a key budget vote, Sharon seemed only to have been buoyed by the turn of events, quipping and calm as he held forth at a rare, nationally broadcast marathon press conference Thursday morning.
"Disengagement will be implemented - period. I repeat, it will be implemented - period," Sharon said. "It will be implemented according to the [mid-2005] timetable that has been set."
To all appearances, Sharon resolved some time ago to stake his career on the Trump Card, the opportunity that might be afforded by clearing the decks of Shinui in order to pave the way for a government anchored by the Likud, midwifed by the ultra-Orthodox, and clinched by the vocally pro-disengagement Labor.
To the clear fascination of the veteran reporters present, Sharon proceeded to give what was perhaps the speech of his life, a ringing, sprawling kick-off to a most unusual political campaign, one aimed specifically at putting off elections - at least long enough to take Israel out of Gaza.
The 76-year-old Sharon left little doubt that this was to be the campaign of his life.
"The generation of which I am a member, which had the privilege of watching Israel from a tiny nation, which saw the greatest of victories and the most terrible of reversals, which lost the best of its friends," Sharon said, "it is preferable that those of this generation who are able - and in my view I am still able to do this - carry on its shoulders the issue of the solution."
Implied in Sharon's words was at least one other member of the generation that took part in Israel's founding, the prime minister's once and, perhaps, future coalition partner, the octagenarian Shimon Peres of Labor.
"No one stays around forever, right?" Sharon continued. "I felt it important that those who saw these things, and who became experienced in them, those who were a part of all these struggles, carry this through, because they are aware both of the dangers that exist and of the opportunities that exist."
The disengagement, circa 1988
Sharon traced the origins of the disengagement back to the first intifada, in 1988. He told the reporters that he had proposed the idea to then-prime minister Yitzhak Shamir at a gathering of cabinet ministers, only to be promptly and bluntly shot down.
"I said then that in order for Israel to avoid being pushed back ultimately to the 1967 borders, we should bring about partition of the territory."
At present, he said, "We are facing fateful decisions and it's important to have a wide, stable unity government. Leaving Gaza is the most important thing now in the view of most of the Israeli public," he added, in a reference to opinion polls showing nearly 60 percent support for the plan.
Earlier this year, Shinui and Labor had pressed for the "big bang," a disengagement-oriented Likud-Labor-Shinui secularist coalition. But Likud field bosses nixed the proposal, in part because the Likud would have constituted a minority within its own government.
On Wednesday night, Sharon lost no time in administering a raft of letters prepared in advance, sacking the five Shinui ministers - one of them barely two days in office - thus shattering the last remaining bond of his ruling coalition.
The balance sheet at the end of the dismissals and defections set another record for standing Israeli governments. The coalition which roared into power last year with a solid 68 votes in the 120-seat Knesset, now consists in its entirety of the 40 lawmakers of the Likud - at least 10 of whom fall into the "rebel" class of vigorous opponents of disengagement.
"What options does Sharon have left? What else can the prime minister try now, after he's run through all the other possibilities, fired everyone possible, marshaled all the resources he could?" asked commentator Shalom Yerushalmi on Thursday.
"The only thing he has left today is to turn to the Labor Party, the very last card in his deck."
'There is no other alternative'
"As prime minister, it is my responsibility to continue to run the country - all of the country," Sharon declared. "Under the circumstances that have been created, there is no alternative but to begin officially to try to widen the coalition with the Labor Party and the religious parties."
The first obstacle in the path of Sharon's heaven-and-earth moving equipment will be the mercurial Likud Central Committee, which, in its frequent role of spoiler, handed Sharon a smarting political setback earlier this year by voting - twice - to bar him from opening talks with Labor over a unity government.
Recently, however, close observers of the Central Committee have noted a new mood in the Central Committee, which historically relishes the role of kingmaker more than it does that of spoiler.
Some have credited the change to two concurrent factors: the altered political-diplomatic atmosphere created in the aftermath of the death of Central Committee bogeyman Yasser Arafat, and on Thursday, two key Likud players, Likud Central Committee Chairman Tzachi Hanegbi, who supports disengagement, and Yisrael Katz, who opposes it, both weighed in with an assessment that a coalition of Likud, Labor, UTJ and perhaps the Sephardi ultra-Orthodox Shas stood a good chance of passage.
Their view was bolstered by an Israel Radio poll released Thursday, which showed that a clear majority of Likud voters favored a unity government with the Labor Party and UTJ.
"It's clear that in the political reality that has been created, there are two options: a unity government, or going to early elections. I hope that my comrades in the Likud will understand that the time has come to decide between these two alternatives. There is no other alternative," said Sharon.
The election threat could be a powerful weapon in Sharon's hands. Polls show that many of the 40 Likud lawmakers, including some of the back-benchers who oppose disengagement, could lose their jobs if elections took place soon.
If, on the other hand, Sharon's all-or-nothing gamble pays off, he could be the first Israeli prime minister to complete his full term in the last dozen years.
"Elections at this point are not what the State of Israel needs," Sharon continued. "Neither are they what the Likud needs. We are in the process of diplomatic and economic processes of the highest importance, and it is clear that elections will delay them."
"For the benefit of the State of Israel, I hope that we shall succeed in establishing a stable new coalition which will rule until November 2006." |
