REVISIONIST ZIONISM ABOUT TO TRIUMPH AS NEVER BEFORE

SHARON STILL AHEAD IN POLLS BY AT LEAST 15%

"The 554,000 Arabs eligible to vote represent 12.3 percent of the electorate. The Arab turnout in 1999 was 76%, and 95% voted for Barak."

With or without the "Arab vote", Barak and Labor Zionism are in all likelihood going to be trounced by Sharon and Revisionist Zionism in just a few days now. This even though nearly everyone in the world -- especially the Europeans, "liberal" American Jews, the Arab client regimes, and Arafat's "Authority" -- have collectively done all they could to prevent just what is about to happen in the Jewish State. And though there are many similarlities between the two major historical Zionist movements, as well as between Barak and Sharon, there are also very important differences not just in style but most importantly in ideological outlook and convictions.

This is not the place to even attempt to spell out these complicated differences. There's plenty of literature available however. Those interested should start with the biography of Jabotinsky, the father of the Revisionist Movement, just as Ben-Gurion was the father of Labor Zionism. It's not really possible to seriously understanding what is happening today either within the Israeli polity or between the Jews and the Arabs, without a firm historical grasp of what has come before and how we have gotten to such a historical moment pregnant with such dangers. Meanwhile, this selection of articles from the Israeli Press about Sharon, Barak, and the election campaign, helps put the current moment in better perspective:

PA CALLS ON VOTERS NOT TO VOTE FOR SHARON
Ori Nir, Ha'aretz Correspondent

[Ha'aretz - 1/24/01:} Palestinian Information Minister Yasser Abed Rabbo and chief negotiator Saeb Erekat called on Israeli voters Wednesday not to vote for Likud Chair Ariel Sharon in the upcoming election. In an interview in an Arab magazine published in Israel, they both warned of the consequences of having Sharon as prime minister.

"We do not want Sharon to be elected as prime minister. Our stance on this subject is not neutral," said Abed Rabbo. "The election of Sharon will lead to disaster and war. Choosing him is a stupid move because he is a bloodthirsty racist who has no responsibility to his countrymen," Abed Rabbo added. Erekat, who heads the negotiations with Israel, said, "If Sharon is elected, we should expect the total collapse of negotiations."

Many Arabs who are prominent in the public sector said that senior officials in the Palestinian Authority requested that Arab leaders work towards voting for Prime Minister Ehud Barak, in order to prevent the rise of Sharon to the position of prime minister.

SHARON: LEBANON PULLOUT LED TO INTIFADA
By Gil Hoffman and Janine Zacharia

JERUSALEM POST (January 25) - Likud prime ministerial candidate Ariel Sharon yesterday accused Prime Minister Ehud Barak of indirectly causing the recent wave of violence by showing weakness in the manner in which he withdrew the IDF from Lebanon last May.

"I have tough things to say about the way we left, which influenced, in my opinion, what happened later on, and the feelings of the Palestinians, our neighbors," Sharon told a Federation of Chambers of Commerce forum. "We did not act the way an independent country is supposed to act."

Sharon maintained that Israel showed weakness to the Palestinians in the pullback, which invited them to fight back and feel confident against a weakened IDF.

He made the comments at a time in which his campaign has begun to break with its hesitant strategy and strike back at Barak's negative commercials.

Sharon campaign sources said that new commercials tonight will slam Barak for continuing the Taba negotiations and accuse him of "not learning the lesson that a nation with dignity does not negotiate under fire."

The commercials will run under the new slogan: "Barak promised peace; Barak brought war."

The increasing negativity of the Sharon campaign is a response to a particularly sharp Barak ad that premiered Tuesday, describing step by step what would happen between the election of Sharon and an all-out regional war. The ad angered Sharon aides.

"Barak has killed all the sacred cows," Lior Horev, Sharon's information and strategy team manager, said. "We could have used the Kfar Darom children in our advertising, but we did not because there is a line that people do not cross, even during a campaign."

Responding to the Barak campaign's repeated use of the Lebanon War in its ads, Sharon addressed the Sabra and Shatilla killings for the first time since the race began.

"What happened in Lebanon, which we didn't have any connection to or anything, was that Christian Arabs killed Moslem Arabs," Sharon said.

Sharon said that by October 1982, Israeli forces had already withdrawn from major Christian locations in southern Lebanon. At that point he recommended leaving Lebanon and continued to advocate a negotiated withdrawal for years, but that various prime ministers and IDF chiefs of General Staff disagreed.

Sharon was held indirectly responsible for the 1982 massacre in the Beirut Palestinian refugee camps by the government-appointed Kahan Commission. He was subsequently forced to step down as defense minister.

The Barak campaign responded by saying, "The overwhelming consensus says that getting our children out of Lebanon after 18 years of being there for no reason and more than 1,000 casualties is one of the greatest achievements in the history of Israel and one of the most courageous acts that Barak did in his long career."

In an address to the Council on Foreign Relations in New York and Washington via satellite video conference yesterday, Sharon offered a slightly contradictory view of the current wave of violence.

In the beginning of his remarks Sharon said: "A war is going on here, Barak promised peace." During the question-and-answer period, Sharon said: "It's not going to be war. We don't see a war."

Sharon revealed that he has initiated quiet contacts with Arab countries and has started communicating with the Palestinian leadership. He did not specify which countries he had contacted.

One source privy to these contacts said Sharon had been in touch with Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat's deputy Mahmoud Abbas.

Sharon gave special praise to Jordan as an important stabilizing factor and pledged to try to strengthen ties with it, but it was not clear if Jordan was among the countries Sharon had approached.

Sharon outlined his now well-known "multi-stage" plan for peace, or at least for a "non-belligerency" arrangement. He ruled out for the first time the possibility of unilateral separation from the Palestinians should peace talks fail. Barak has solicited ideas for such a break.

"It looks like a slogan. How can you divide? We live together. I don't see any possibility of separation that can last," Sharon said.

To lend legitimacy to his gradual approach to peacemaking, Sharon cited the ideas of former US secretary of state Henry Kissinger, who Sharon says "has been preaching this approach to prime ministers of Israel" for years.

"[Kissinger] emphasized that the only way to reach peace is by going slowly, gradually, step-by-step, and implementing something which is more similar to non-belligerency, and only when we see the benefits and a relationship will develop will we be able to reach a permanent peace," Sharon said.

As foreign minister under prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu, Sharon promoted stronger ties with Russia, the cosponsor of the original multilateral peace talks in Madrid. Yesterday, Sharon called for a reduced US role in peace negotiations and said he would establish immediate contact with Secretary of State Colin Powell if elected.

The US is "a traditional friend of Israel" which can help bring the sides together if needed, Sharon said. "But I think that basically, it should be for both sides to decide - to negotiate and decide - and I think it should be very, very clear that Israel should not be under any pressure."

Sharon then said he sees the US as a "mediator, honest broker" and as Israel's continued strategic ally with which it would work to combat the spread of ballistic missiles in the region.

Sharon vowed to invite the Labor Party into a national unity government the night of his election and promised to initiate negotiations immediately with the Palestinians, but not if Israel is under fire.

Asked repeatedly how he could make peace with the Palestinians and other Arab countries, Sharon said he has been "demonized for many years" by the Left and called on all parties to look to the future and leave the past behind.

Sharon ducked questions on whether he would dismantle settlements, saying Barak's gravest error was to publicize which concessions he would be willing to make in advance.

After outlining his terms of a non-belligerency accord - no acceptance of a Palestinian right of return, no division of Jerusalem, no handover of the Jordan Valley to Palestinian control - Sharon said the ideas had been part of a plan that was put on the table during short-lived, permanent-status negotiations when he was foreign minister.

SHARON: I HAD NOTHING TO DO WITH CAMPS MASSACRE
By Yossi Verter

[Ha'aretz - 1/25/01}:
Meretz MK Zahava Gal On yesterday petitioned the High Court of Justice to release the confidential reports on which the Kahan Commission recommended that Sharon be dismissed as defense minister after the 1982 Sabra and Chatilla massacre in Lebanon.

The petition was in response to Sharon declaring he had nothing to do with the massacre in the Palestinian refugee camps. "I had nothing to do with what happened there. Christian Arabs killed Muslim Arabs, and as a result of the atmosphere of hysteria in Israel, I was forced to leave my post," Sharon told the Federation of Israeli Chambers of Commerce at the Hilton hotel in Tel Aviv.

Sharon resigned from Menachem Begin's government after the Kahan Commission report into the slaughter of hundreds of Palestinian civilians by the Phalangist militia during the Israel Defense Forces siege of Beirut. The commission wrote in its report that "the defense minister reach personal conclusions of the shortcomings he exhibited in carrying out his duties," and recommended that Prime Minister Begin dismiss Sharon - in fact he resigned on his own accord.

Meretz MK Ilan Gillon yesterday wrote to Supreme Court Justice Aharon Barak, who was a member of the Kahan Commission, and asked him to clarify for the public the committee's stance on Sharon.

"It is unacceptable that Sharon is blaming a commission of inquiry, which found him responsible, of succumbing to hysteria and distorting justice, while he takes advantage of the fact that none of the committee members can respond," he said.

Gal On said "it is the public's right to receive the information that directly relates to the actions and shortcomings of Ariel Sharon."

Sharon continued efforts to dispel his anti-Arab image and yesterday said if elected prime minister, he will begin a new chapter in relations between Arab Israeli citizens and the state.

Speaking to members of One Nation Sharon said "I intend to open a new chapter with them [Israeli Arabs] in the name of Israel's government. I will personally work to bring equality to their conditions in infrastructure, education, civil service jobs ... a Jewish child and an Arab child must receive the same ... ."

Minister Shimon Peres yesterday responded to Sharon's claim, made on Monday at a high-school in the Negev, that it was Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Peres as his defense minister that brought Israel into Lebanon in 1976.

Peres said Israel did not occupy or remain in Lebanon, and did not even have liaison officers working with local militias. Peres said early 1976 was at the peak of the civil war in Lebanon and the Christians sought support from Israel against Palestinian and other organizations. Israel helped the Christians with humanitarian aid at first, and later also with weapons and munitions.

ARAB LEADERS: ONLY APOLOGY WILL GET US TO VOTE FOR BARAK
By David Rudge

JERUSALEM POST - NAZARETH (January 25) - Arabs would consider voting for Prime Minister Ehud Barak only if he publicly apologizes for the government's handling of the disturbances last October in which 13 Arabs were killed, and reaches a draft accord with the Palestinians, Ibrahim Sarsur, the head of the Islamic Movement, said yesterday.

The movement would then reconsider its call to supporters to boycott the vote, Sarsur told The Jerusalem Post.

In previous prime ministerial elections, the Arab vote was viewed as having a pivotal role, especially in close-fought races.

"We Arabs have decided to liberate ourselves from the handcuffs of this concept. In our opinion, [Ariel] Sharon and Barak are equally bad and neither will bring about peace or equality. If Barak won 350,000 Arab votes in the 1999 elections, he will be lucky to get 40,000-50,000 this time," Sarsur said.

"If, however, the Palestinians and the Israelis reach a framework agreement and Barak makes a public apology for the October massacre, and not just expresses his regrets as he has until now, then the Islamic Movement and all the factions in the Arab sector would have to reconsider their positions in light of these developments and give him another chance," he said.

The 554,000 Arabs eligible to vote represent 12.3 percent of the electorate. The Arab turnout in 1999 was 76%, and 95% voted for Barak.

Barak's problem of raising support in the Arab sector was underlined yesterday during a visit to Nazareth, where scores demonstrated outside the hall where he met with supporters.

Many of the demonstrators were relatives of the three Nazareth residents among the 13 killed in the October riots. They accused Barak of having overall responsibility for what they described as police brutality and excessive use of force.

There were reports that some of the demonstrators spat at those who arrived to attend the meeting with Barak and called them traitors.

Barak, who was accompanied by Justice Minister Yossi Beilin and Meretz MK Zehava Gal-On, did not have to run the gauntlet of protesters and entered the hall by another route. Regional Cooperation Minister Shimon Peres did not attend the meeting despite reports that he had been scheduled to participate.

Inside the hall, the atmosphere was totally different, with Barak reiterating his regrets and expressing sorrow over the 13 deaths, and urging supporters to do their utmost to garner votes in the Arab sector.

He said that confrontation between police and demonstrators should not end in fatalities and that he is certain that the government would accept the findings of the state commission which is investigating the riots.

Barak warned that a boycott of the elections or casting blank ballots would be a vote for Sharon.

Ministers Beilin and Matan Vilna'i have been working hard among Arabs to try to calm the atmosphere and forge a core of activists willing to canvass for Barak.

Beilin, who spoke at the meeting, criticized comments made by Shas spiritual leader Rabbi Ovadia Yosef that likened Palestinians to venomous snakes and described Barak as someone who hated Israel and Judaism.

According to many political pundits, an Arab boycott or a decision to cast blank ballots would have a seriously detrimental effect on Barak's chances of being reelected.

Sarsur said the decision to call for a boycott was based on what he described as Barak's ongoing policies of aggression, killing, and destruction against the Palestinians, the regression in the peace process despite initially high expectations, the non-implementation of his promises to improve the lot of Israeli Arabs, and the "massacre by police under the command of the prime minister" of the 13 Arabs.

Sarsur, who represents the more pragmatic southern faction of the Islamic Movement, categorically denied reports that his decision to call for a boycott was a move toward the more radical northern branch, headed by Umm el-Fahm Mayor Sheikh Raed Salah, as part of efforts to reunite the movement.

The northern faction and its leadership have consistently opposed participation in national politics, while the southern branch has its representatives in the Knesset in the United Arab List and has established the Arab Unity Party.

"Unfortunately, negotiations over reunification stopped over a month ago and have been frozen, and therefore there is no linkage between this and our decision to call for a boycott of the election," Sarsur added.

Abed Inbitawi, executive director of the supreme monitoring committee of the Israeli Arab leadership, said that "obviously to say one is sorry is insufficient, although even an apology does not go far enough. Barak also has to take responsibility for what happened.

"If he does and if there is a draft peace accord with the leadership of the Palestinian people prior to the election, then it would make a difference to the present trend under which more than 80% of eligible voters will either boycott the election or cast blank ballots.

"There is also a third factor - the need for a detailed program, with a mechanism for implementation, to bring about full equality for Arab citizens in all fields. These are the three conditions which have to be met to bring out the Arab voters."

Inbitawi said it had been decided to convene a meeting of the monitoring committee a few days before the election to recommend - on the basis of prevailing circumstances - how the Arab public should vote. The committee is composed of Arab MKs, council heads, and other prominent public figures.

JEERS AND ANGER GREET BARAK AND HIS ARAB "DIGNATARIES" ON CAMPAIGN VISIT TO NAZARETH
By David Ratner and Jalal Bana

"An Arab girl cursed me. I have never been cursed by a girl before. The Arabs have become like the Likud."

[Ha'aretz - 1/25/01] - When Ehud Barak ended his election visit in Ganei Nazareth Hotel last night, some of those invited stayed behind to argue among themselves whether the prime minister had really apologized for the deaths of 13 Israeli Arab demonstrators last October.

The text of his speech shows Barak indeed expressed "sorrow and a need to express condolences" - but in no way did he apologize or take responsibility for the death of the 13.

Stormy weather and a few dozen angry demonstrators greeted those invited to the election meeting. The guests were identified as "Arab dignitaries and their families." Barak was brought in through a back entrance to avoid him meeting the demonstrators, and most of the 250 guests looked like they would rather be somewhere else.

"Dignitaries" was a bit of a misnomer. Apart from the mayors of Rami and Ilut - both Labor Party activists - other mayors boycotted the event on orders from the Higher Arab Monitoring Committee.

Representatives of families of the 13 Arabs killed in the October riots held up color photographs of the dead loved ones and angry placards. There were a few megaphones and a great deal of fury.

They waited on the hotel driveway, spitting insults at all the arriving guests. "They have no honor," said Barda Afifi of Nazareth. "Pig, traitor," he shouted. "See them run to kiss the feet of those who kill them," he said.

There were pale faces of teenage girls and boys behind the curtains of a bus bringing them from the village of Kara. Mazen Zahalka, a dignitary from the village of Kara, said "on one hand, it is hard to look the mothers of those killed in the eye, but on the other, I know the alternative to Barak is Sharon -and that kills me."

The demonstrators began to shout "Collaborators!" and Zahalka scurried into the hotel. A young woman with curly hair from Barak's office gave them yellow roses. The children were taken aside and dressed in white Barak campaign T-shirts, some with the slogan from the previous campaign, "Israel wants a change." Scattered about the hall were white balloons that occasionally burst with a feeble pop.

Barak's entourage entered the hall at a quarter past five. Barak was accompanied by Ministers Beilin, Vilnai, Cohen and Tamir and a few Meretz MKs. Gradually the trauma outside was forgotten. Beilin stole the show when he said Sharon was born a racist, and that his inability to make peace was genetic.

MK Hussniya Jabara (Meretz) called Sharon a "war criminal" but Barak repudiated the epithet. By the time he got up to speak, the crowd had warmed somewhat but his speech was predictable and superficial. He said he had wanted to meet the families of those killed in October, but did not have the opportunity. He said that until a few weeks ago, he had not been aware of the deep damage wrought to the fabric of relations between Israel's Jews and Arabs. He told them to vote according to their interests, and not to cast a blank ballot.

Afterward, everyone went home. Afif Halili from Majdal Krum was still upset by the demonstration outside. "An Arab girl cursed me. I have never been cursed by a girl before. The Arabs have become like the Likud."