Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon took a battering in the press Monday after being out-dueled at a Likud Party meeting by outspoken former premier Benjamin Netanyahu, who is making a bid for a political comeback.
“The prime minister is lucky because no-one will remember this gathering," the Haaretz paper said in its wrap-up of a feisty Sunday night meeting of Likud's central committee in Tel Aviv.
"The crowd was overwhelmingly in Netanyahu's corner," the Jerusalem Post said. "They remained relatively silent during Netanyahu's speech but interrupted Sharon's speech with virtually non-stop heckling."
Facing growing discontent over what many see as a soft approach in dealing with the Palestinians, Sharon squared off with Netanyahu in the first public meeting of the two men since Sharon's landslide election victory in February.
The 73-year-old former general told around 800 members of the party's central committee that his self-declared policy of "restraint" in the face of continuing Palestinian violence was the only viable option for the Jewish state right now.
"We have two possibilities -- either undertake harsh military actions against the Palestinian Authority, its leaders and institutions, or launch immediate spontaneous operations on the dot after each attack," the prime minister said.
"The alternative path is the right path," Sharon said.
But Netanyahu, who has a full-time political office and has been stumping his way around the country with high-profile visits to families of victims of Palestinian violence, savaged Sharon's policies in a mocking 25-minute speech.
"No negotiations under fire!" Netanyahu boomed, repeating one of Sharon's regular pledges to the Israeli people. The crowd responded: "Done!"
"No negotiations with continued terrorism!" the fiery Netanyahu went on -- and again the crowd answered, "Done!
"Jewish blood will not be sacrificed!" he continued, mocking the last of the prime minister's trio of recurring promises, while Netanyahu supporters chanted: "It is! It is!"
In a final twist, the 51-year-old Netanyahu then asked the crowd to applaud Sharon and give him their respect, Haaretz reported.
Sharon believes the restraint policy is essential in securing support for the Israeli position from the international community, seen as overwhelmingly pro-Palestinian.
Although the next election is not scheduled until November 2003, Netanyahu has begun capitalizing on growing disenchantment, particularly among his core hardline supporters, with Sharon's low-key response to the Palestinians.
Last week he called Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat "the head of the largest terror organization in the world" and said Sunday the 1993 Oslo Accords were responsible for creating "an infrastructure for terror."
"Netanyahu is gathering momentum within the Likud and in the national camp in general, particularly because of the profound frustration within the Israeli Right with the policy of restraint," commentator Yossi Olmert wrote in the Post.
The Maariv paper reported last week that Netanyahu's own internal polling shows him easily winning a head-to-head contest with Sharon for the Likud Party's leadership by more than 20 percent of the vote.
But analysts cautioned that Netanyahu, who narrowly escaped prosecution last year for possible fraud and corruption during his tenure in office, must not be seen as undermining Sharon during the crisis with the Palestinians.
The next meeting of the Likud central committee is scheduled for September, when the party will set the terms for its leadership race -- which in effect will determine who will be its candidate in the next elections.
Sharon has already announced he will seek a second term -- JERUSALEM (AFP)
© 2001 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
