SHARON PREPARES FOR CONFLICT WITH "MODERATE" PROPAGANDA OFFENSIVE

AND ATTEMPTS TO CO-OPT EVERYONE

It's time for serious political confusion and disinformation now. As the armies prepare themselves for the clashes likely to come in one form or another, the politicians maneuver for new starting positions. Of course in many cases, especially that of Ariel Sharon and Ehud Barak, the armies and the politicians are one in the same.

Part of preparation for conflict and war these days is positioning oneself in public opinion. And that is precisely where Sharon has gone, full-speed ahead. Top-level propaganda teams have already been dispatched to Washington and European capitals. They will court the media in public; discuss things with key allies and political leaders in private.

As for Arafat and Regime...ill-prepared and not up to the task as usual.

The Palestinian people are saddled with this corrupt, inept, and incompetent regime. They are now paying the price for so many years of mistakes and, at best, mediocrity. Unless the Palestinian people can somehow remove Arafat and Regime and replace it with some of the far more capable and far more principled Palestinians -- Dr. Haider Abdul Shafi at the top of the list -- they cannot expect things to get better for them. Indeed, far more tragic times might be ahead for the Palestinian people facing the thugs of Sharon and the right-wingers in the U.S. -- even the possibility of another mass expulsion or the forceable conversion of the Hashemite Regime into the Palestinian State.

More on this from MER in the weeks ahead. As we've said before...stay tuned.

SHARON OFFERS BARAK DEFENSE POST
By Laurie Copans

JERUSALEM (AP - 9 February): Prime Minister-elect Ariel Sharon on Friday offered his predecessor, Ehud Barak, the job of defense minister in a joint government, even though the two disagree sharply on how to make peace with the Palestinians.

Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat and Sharon, meanwhile, spoke by phone - their first direct contact since Sharon's election victory Tuesday. Palestinian officials confirmed the call, but would not reveal what was said.

Israeli radio stations said Arafat told Sharon he was interested in resuming peace talks with Israel, and congratulated him on the recent birth of twin grandsons. Sharon responded that peace was important to him and not an election gimmick. Sharon also said he wants to alleviate the suffering of the Palestinians, but that first there must be an end to violence, the radios said.

In their meeting Friday, Sharon offered Barak the position of defense minister, according to a Sharon aide. Barak's aides were not available for comment on how he responded to the offer, but Israeli radio stations said Barak told Sharon he would stay out of politics for a while.

As Sharon and Arafat spoke, an intense gun battle erupted between Israeli troops and Palestinians near the West Bank town of Ramallah. Twenty-seven Palestinians and a Belgian news photographer were injured, Palestinian medics said. Of the injured, eight were hit by live fire, including the photographer who was shot in the leg.

During the gun battle, which raged for most of the afternoon, Israeli soldiers aimed machine gun fire at empty high-rise apartment buildings used by Palestinian gunmen as cover. Smoke billowed from one of the buildings as shots hit the wall.

In the Gaza Strip, the Islamic militant group Hamas threatened to carry out more suicide attacks against Israel; on Thursday, unidentified assailants had exploded a car bomb in Jerusalem, injuring an Israeli woman. In the Gaza march, some 2,500 Hamas supporters chanted "Destroy the center of Tel Aviv," and burned effigies of Sharon and President Bush.

One Hamas banner held up by the crowd read "Generals like Sharon only understand the language of resistance and holy war."

Overnight, Israeli troops and Palestinian gunmen battled for about three hours near the Jewish settlement of Psagot, adjacent to the Palestinian town of El Bireh. Several buildings in a residential neighborhood of El Bireh were damaged by Israeli fire, including the offices of the Konrad Adenauer Foundation, a German aid group, and the Red Crescent, a Palestinian first aid organization. No one was injured.

Sharon said in an interview published Friday that he would seek an open-ended non-belligerency pact with the Palestinians, not a peace agreement, and that he would not follow Barak's path.

Barak's far-reaching offers to the Palestinians "made it difficult for all future Israeli governments," Sharon told the Yediot Ahronot daily.

Still, Sharon said, he felt sorry for his predecessor. "So many dreams, and everything crumbled between his fingers," Sharon said of Barak whom he trounced in Tuesday's election, winning by a margin of almost 25 percentage points.

On Thursday, Barak baffled his Labor Party when he said he wanted to lead the coalition talks with Sharon. On election night, Barak had announced he was stepping down as party leader and was withdrawing from politics for a while.

Labor's elder statesman, Shimon Peres, supported the idea of a so-called national unity government, saying the nation is going through a "great crisis," reference to months of Israeli-Palestinian clashes that have killed 385 people, most of them Palestinians

The Labor Party is deeply divided over whether to accept Sharon's offer. Labor Party doves, including Justice Minister Yossi Beilin, said Labor must not join forces with the hard-line Likud party which opposes concessions to the Palestinians.

Barak's offers included setting up a Palestinian state in the almost all of the West Bank and Gaza, sharing Jerusalem and dismantling many Jewish settlements.

The Palestinians did not accept Barak's proposals, but negotiator Ahmed Qureia said talks must restart from the point where they ended just before Israel's Tuesday election.

Sharon said all along that Barak's ideas would not obligate him, and Barak agreed.

Barak's Labor party was the first Sharon invited for coalition talks, which began Thursday evening. Likud officials told Labor representatives that they would be offered such top portfolios as the defense or foreign ministries, Israeli media reported.

But the Labor negotiators said they wanted details on Sharon's plans for peace talks with the Palestinians before they agreed to discuss the distribution of ministries. The two teams will meet again Sunday.

If Sharon is unable to come to quick agreement with Labor, he is expected to turn to right-wing and Orthodox Jewish parties and form a coalition with a narrow majority.

LIKUD INVITES ARAB PARTIES TO COALITION TALKS
By Mazal Mualem

[Ha'aretz - 2/9/01]: Likud secretary general, Uri Shani, invited the leaders of Arab parties in the Knesset yesterday to begin negotiations in an effort to include them in a broad coalition government.

Shani approached MK Talab A Sana (United Arab List), and MK Ahmed Tibi (Ta'al), and invited them to meet in order to conduct negotiations over their participation in a coalition government.

The senior Likud official added that he also intended to invite MK Mohammed Barakeh (Hadash) and MK Azmi Bishara (Balad) to join the talks.

It is expected that meetings with the Arab MKs will be held early next week.

The Likud issued a statement which said that the purpose of the meetings was to create a dialogue with the Arab parties in the Knesset and to inform their representatives of developments in the efforts to form a coalition government and seek their opinions on the matter.

In addition, there are those around Sharon who are considering offering Arab parties the option of joining the coalition if initial meetings produce an appropriate climate for the move.

In response to the invitation, MK A Sana said that this is an important development and saw Sharon's willingness to encourage a dialogue with the Arab representatives as a welcome change of approach.

"The call from Uri Shani surprised me. At first I though that he had made a mistake," A Sana said. He added that the meeting with the Likud did not, of course, bind them to an agreement to join the coalition, but "Barak did not even give us the chance to say No."

Barakeh said that "as a public relations idea, this is not bad, but I am not part of it. This may [simply] be an effort to embarrass the Labor party and Meretz.

Mid-East Realities

www.middleeast.org

Source: http://www.middleeast.org/articles/2001/2/63.htm