A troubled but still potent American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) got a boost this week from Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, who addressed its largest-ever policy conference in Washington, with a record 4,500 delegates gathered for three days of speeches, workshops, schmoozing and lobbying.
Israeli officials are expecting such massive resistance to the disengagement that they have developed a detailed plan of operation to carry it out.
Civil strife in Israel over Prime Minister Ariel Sharon\’s Gaza disengagement plan could cause new strains in the American Jewish community and accelerate the turning away from the pro-Israel cause, especially among younger Jews.
The late February suicide bombing in Tel Aviv shattered a three-month lull in terror and brought key Israeli-Palestinian peacemaking issues into sharp relief.
The terror attack, which came just three weeks after Israeli and Palestinian leaders declared an end to more than four years of hostilities, forced both sides to define their new relationship more clearly.
It enabled Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to clarify his policy toward the Palestinians, finger Syria and the Hezbollah as potential spoilers, and re-emphasize his view that there can be no real peacemaking until the Palestinians dismantle their armed terrorists.
I, along with what the polls say is 60 percent of Israelis — and maybe even Ariel Sharon, too — trust Mahmoud Abbas\’ good intentions. More than that, I\’m impressed by what he\’s done on the ground — by prevailing on Hamas and the other terrorist groups to \”cool down\” the violence a week after he took office, and reading them the riot act after their rockets started flying again a day after the hopeful Sharm el-Sheik summit.
This week\’s Israel Christian Nexus gathering at Stephen S. Wise Temple was intended to rally support for Israel. Its advertised list of speakers included John Fishel, president of The Jewish Federation of Greater Los Angeles, and a fair number of prominent local rabbis.
Sharon hopes to create sufficient motivation among settlers to evacuate their homes willingly in exchange for generous compensation packages, avoiding violent confrontations like those in Yamit.
Politically — for the first time in the history of the Jewish people — the State of Israel is apparently working toward establishing foreign sovereignty over a part of our land.
The state prosecutor\’s recommendation to indict Ariel Sharon on bribery charges came just as the Israeli prime minister was putting the finishing touches on his plan for Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip and parts of the West Bank.
There is something Marxist about Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon\’s pledge to \”disengage\” Israel from the Palestinians through the completion of a security barrier and the evacuation of a few settlements. Just like Groucho Marx, Sharon is declaring his intention to leave and stay at the same time.
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