Ariel Sharon has been Prime Minister ever since Barak was unceremoniously run out of office by Israeli voters in 2001. Sharon is the only Prime Minister in the past two decades to win re-election, because he is the only one to have stopped the wholesale surrender to our avowed enemies that has been called the “Peace Process”.
In 3 years, Sharon has succeeded in rolling back Palestinian, American, and even Israeli expectations about what shape a future Middle East might take. It has come to the point where President Bush is even willing to consider making a statement acknowledging that the “final boundaries” might not resemble the old “Green Line” armistice lines.
But Sharon must now deal with the next Ehud – a monster largely of Sharon’s own making: Ehud Olmert. Olmert has never been much of a hawk on diplomatic matters, and in the last six months has become the Likud’s leading leftist. He is proving what a lot of people on the right have been saying for years – that the Likud is a centrist rather than a right-wing party.
Olmert is the man who conceived of this season’s hot political topic, the “Unilateral Pullout” plan that would have Israel withdrawing under fire from the Gaza Strip for nothing in return from the Palestinians, much like we did from Lebanon under the first Ehud. The pullout from Lebanon provided an example of what the Palestinians could hope to achieve by rejecting negotiations and resorting to terrorism, and the withdrawal from Gaza under similar circumstances will reinforce that example.
Yet Olmert has been able to convince Sharon that his plan is the way to go – despite Sharon’s vehement opposition to other similar plans, such as Oslo and the Lebanon pullout, that have gone before. And he has done so in a similar, if far more blatant, fashion to Yossi Beilin’s effort at convincing Yitzchak Rabin to accept Oslo.
In the last week, Olmert has made two statements that should give every Israeli patriot reason to be nervous. First, he explained that, in his estimation, Israel’s unilateral withdrawal from the Gaza strip and four Samarian communities would not end terrorism. I find it quite impossible to follow the logic behind the plan if that is the case. It should be the sole aim of any diplomatic or security plan to end the terrorist war against Israel in as decisively victorious fashion as possible. Yet the best this government can offer, based on Olmert’s driving force, is a plan that will deprive Israel of land and destroy a number of its communities, while not achieving anything in return.
Olmert’s second statement was that Israel should withdraw anyway, since there are 7500 Israeli residents in Gaza, living in the midst of over 1 million Palestinians. This is not the first time we have heard such statements from Israel’s purported leaders. The only difference this time is that the purveyor of the statement this time is not a member of a left-wing party.
If we follow Olmert’s statements to their logical conclusion, then Jews have no right living in the State of Israel at all. After all, the Arabs have been complaining all along that we are a mere 5 million people living in the midst of 100 million Arabs, and that Israel should be a part of their hegemony. Why is Gaza different from the rest of Israel?
Or even better: There are only 13 million Jews in the whole world out of a total of 6.25 billion people. By Olmert’s logic, we shouldn’t be living anywhere in the world. After all, many of our enemies have been saying just that for the past 3000 years. Why should the modern State of Israel be any different than, say, Spain of the 16th century, or England of the 11th century, or Germany of the mid-20th century.
Ehud Olmert’s statements last week belong more in the lexicon of an Ehud Barak, or a Yossi Beilin, or a Shimon Peres. They do not belong in the Likud. What Olmert has proven by these statements is that, whatever his accomplishments (or lack thereof) in his previous positions, he fully deserves the 34th place slot he was awarded in the most recent Likud primaries. He does not deserve the senior ministerial position he has been granted in the current government.
It is no secret that Olmert is one of the new guard that Sharon is apparently grooming to succeed him as head of the Likud. If Olmert indeed takes over the party when Sharon retires, he will lead the Likud to the same political wasteland to which Peres and Beilin have led the left, based on the same nonsensical ideas. And if the Likud rank and file elect him as their next leader, they will fully deserve the same ignominy.
It is high time that Ehud Olmert finally admit what has become obvious to many – that he belongs in the Labor Party or in Yossi Beilin’s new “Yahad” party, where he can do far less damage to the State of Israel than he is doing in the Likud.
Copyright 2004. All rights reserved. Yehuda Poch is a journalist living in Israel. Reproduction in electronic or print format by permission of the author only.
