Artículo de Henry Siegman en "The International Herald Tribune" del 7-1-03

There are those who believe that when Ariel Sharon assumes a second term as prime minister after the Jan. 28 election - a likelihood predicted by all polls and reinforced by the latest suicide bombings - he will turn his attention to peacemaking with the Palestinians. Clearly, that is what Sharon would like Israeli moderate voters to believe. .To that end he has not only embraced President George W. Bush's vision of a two-state solution but has publicly warned fellow Likud members that those who object to his "commitment" to Palestinian statehood will have no place in his new government. .Those who entertain a benign view of the future based on such declarations are profoundly out of touch with Israeli political realities. Sharon's talk of Palestinian statehood is about as sincere as his stated determination to punish cabinet members who refuse to cooperate fully with the attorney general's investigation of a Likud vote-buying scandal, in which, according to Israeli police, the prime minister's son Omri is allegedly involved. .Unfortunately, there is good reason to fear that the situation will only get worse if Sharon returns to power. Contrary to the image of moderation that he has so assiduously - and effectively - cultivated these past two years, he remains single-mindedly committed to preventing the emergence of a viable and independent Palestinian state. From the very outset of the settler movement in the 1970s, Sharon's overriding goal has been to assure so extensive an expansion of Jewish settlements and their supporting infrastructure - highways, power grids, water sources - as to make a Palestinian state a political and physical impossibility. Sharon learned during his first term of office not to rub his true intentions in the face of an American president, particularly one already inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt. Instead he has missed no occasion to declare his support for President Bush's vague "vision" of a two-state solution, even as he intensifies settlement activity that assures the defeat of such a vision, and turns away every effort to open a political process with the Palestinians. .In an unguarded moment, Omri Sharon recently told a group of Likud faithful not to lose any sleep over his father's support for a Palestinian state. He explained: "We are not living in a vacuum; there is an international reality. But when you speak softly, you can wield a big stick. Today, after all, we are located in the Palestinian areas, we are violating international agreements, but no one is saying anything. The United States is with us. ."So we talk Palestinian state, Palestinian state, but in the meantime, not even Area A exists. And there is no Orient House, there is no Palestinian representation in Jerusalem, and the Palestinians are afraid to wander around with weapons even in their own cities. Obviously we all want peace - who doesn't want peace? But the statement about a Palestinian state is a very remote statement." .Until now, Sharon, the stealth hawk who pretends to be a moderate, has pursued his real agenda with great caution, fearing that he may jeopardize his goal if he overreaches. But by now he may well have concluded that he has even greater leeway than he realized. .Israel's press has reported his boasts to his inner circle that only a year ago the international community came down hard on Israel if Israeli forces merely crossed the border into Palestinian areas A and B, while now they move about as they please throughout the entire West Bank and Gaza, and no one says anything. .Sharon has surrounded himself with security, military and intelligence leaders who are as hawkish as he is. The chief of staff, General Moshe Ya'alon, the Mossad chief, General Meir Dagan, the defense minister, General Shaul Mofaz, the head of military intelligence, General Aharon Zeevi, and the national security adviser, General Efraim Halevy, are all cut from the same military cloth. .All believe that Israel must avoid returning to a political process until Palestinians are totally defeated militarily and until this defeat becomes deeply ingrained in their consciousness. All believe that it is only when Palestinians think and act like a defeated people that a political process can begin. This view was first articulated by Ya'alon after he assumed command of the armed forces in early September, and was subsequently endorsed by Sharon. .Ironically, what hope there may be for a better outcome is provided by the Likud vote-buying scandal, which, according to the latest polls, has already cost the Likud 10 Knesset seats (down from an expected 41 seats to 31). .According to Doron Rosenblum, writing in Ha'aretz, until now Israelis thought that "Sharon's personal lack of basic credibility" was a virtue in the Middle Eastern context, for it balanced the lying of Arafat. "That is why Sharon's winking cynicism, his talk of 'seven days of quiet' that must precede 'serious negotiations,' was received with the same winks and smirks that accompanied his announcement about his 'agreement on the American road map' or his promise of a 'Palestinian state.' It's all hogwash, poppycock! But what virtuosity!" .Now that with the vote-buying scandal Israelis have found that they, too, are the objects of Sharon's deceptions, they seem no longer amused. If the attrition in support for the Likud is not reversed, Sharon may not be able to form a new government without the Labor Party, whose conditions for joining his government - including an immediate halt to all settlement activity - might reverse the suicidal course that both Israel and the Palestinians now seem bent on. .Whether Labor would take a principled position in these circumstances, and not sell its soul for a mess of pottage as it did the last time around - in return for which, Shimon Peres and Fouad Ben-Eliezer served as apologists for Sharon's worst excesses - depends on whether Labor's new leader, Amnon Mitzna, is the man of integrity he claims to be. .The writer is a senior fellow on the Middle East at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York.