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NEWS
Analysis
New Revelations from the Prime Minister
by Aryeh Zisman
The Prime Minister has long been planning his new diplomatic
plan. He invited reporter Yoel Marcus of Ha'aretz--a
newspaper that has been criticizing him on a daily basis and
demanding that he be thoroughly investigated about the Greek
Island scandal and other affairs--to join him for breakfast
at his Shikmim Ranch home on Monday. Marcus was surprised to
hear Sharon outline for the first time a detailed plan with
names of settlements slated for removal. Up to that point
Sharon had spoken only in general terms of "painful
concessions" and had avoided naming specific settlements
under consideration.
Marcus was not the only one surprised by the revelations. The
entire political establishment was stupefied. That same
morning Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom had spoken in favor of
the Road Map, declaring in the Foreign Affairs and Defense
Committee that it was alive and well, but by afternoon the
Road Map's official death certificate had been issued. The
funeral will be held in Washington three weeks from now at an
anticipated meeting between Bush and Sharon, where they will
also serve as the leading eulogizers. Few words of praise
will be said for the Road Map, which never materialized and
faded quickly.
On Monday everybody was talking about Sharon's spin and his
decision to publicize his plan during a week in which he was
scheduled to be investigated by police over the Greek Island
scandal. Both the Left and the Right rushed to declare it was
clearly a spin tactic. Deputy Education Minister Tzvi Handel,
who himself stands to be evacuated from his Gaza residence,
coined the recent slogan, "The deeper the investigations, the
deeper the uprooting." But close scrutiny of the Prime
Minister's recent pronouncements reveals that the plan was
laid out in advance in fine detail. Apparently only the
timing is tied to the investigation scheduled for
Thursday.
The slated move to evacuate 7,500 settlers from 17
settlements in Gaza (leaving intact Nissanit, Eli Nissan and
Dugit, which straddle the Green Line) arrives exactly one
week after the Council of Judea, Samaria and Gaza revealed it
held a meeting with Avigdor Yitzchaki, director-general of
the Prime Minister's Office. The settlers say Yitzchaki
presented them a deal offered by Sharon in which seven
settlements would be evacuated, some in Gaza and some in
Judea and Samaria, in exchange for legislation guaranteeing
other settlements would not be evacuated until a permanent
settlement was reached. Sharon quickly denied the offer and
said the government would not allow itself to be shackled by
such a law.
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