Letter from Jerusalem: Face to Face with Ariel Sharon

By Arlynn Nellhaus

The worldwide media were guests at a recent New Year's reception, featuring a press conference with Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon in Jerusalem.

I was there.

The other international journalists didn't just bring out their pens.

They bared their fangs.

It wasn't only their questions, it was the superior tone in which they asked them.

But no tears need be shed over Sharon. He's been through this a few times. He withstood the attacks with humor and unapologetic firmness.

This was the first time I'd seen Sharon in person.

He resembles a balloon with legs. His white hair is startlingly white, and at first, he appeared pale and drawn. As he responded to the audience, his face took on healthy color.

In person, his English comes across with far greater clarity than it seems to over the electronic media. He might be short and squat, but he's nimble with the come-back.

When he learned that he was the first Prime Minister to be at a New Year's reception for foreign journalists, he grinned and said, "I expect to do this for several more years."

There were some groaners from the press corps - the questions that one journalist asks that are an embarrassment to her colleagues.

The press assumed moral indignation over the news that the Israeli army had bulldozed 21 or 47 houses (depending on which side is reporting) in a 53-year-old, UN-maintained Gaza refugee camp.

Israel took the action in response to the Palestinian killing of four Israeli soldiers -- who all happened to be Arab -- and to destroy some of the 30-plus tunnels from Egypt into Gaza to smuggle weapons and drugs.

The tunnels were as deep as 40-50 feet. On the Gaza side, the destroyed houses -- all of which Israel insists were empty -- covered the tunnel openings.

A foreign journalist read from a column in an English edition of a left-wing Hebrew newspaper. It attacked the Israeli army's destruction of the 21 or 47 houses.

Sharon stopped her after a paragraph or two, dryly commenting, "You don't have to bother reading more. We read the newspapers, too."

A South African reporter postured sanctimoniously, "As a Jew, I'm morally offended by the house demolitions."

Sharon responded, "I am a Jew too. And my responsibility is to protect the Jewish people."

Some other questions raised by the people who bring you your news from these parts were:

REPORTER:"Have you had a vendetta against Arafat since 1982?"

"No," Sharon answered, he had no vendetta against "Mr. Arafat," as he often calls him. (Arafat should one day be asked if he has a vendetta against Sharon, since it was Sharon who forced Arafat from Lebanon in 1982, after Arafat destroyed that country.)

REPORTER:"How can you make peace, if you won't talk to Arafat?"

"Mr. Arafat adopted a strategy of terror," said Sharon. "With Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Fatah (Arafat's militia) and other groups like the Palestinian Front for the Liberation of Palestine, there is a coalition of terror."

REPORTER:"How long are you going to keep Arafat confined to Ramallah?"

"Until he arrests the killers of cabinet minister Rehavam Ze'evi," Sharon said. "In the past, Israel said things, but then there was pressure, and Israel gave up. This is a different government. When it comes to our security, there will be no compromise whatsoever."

REPORTER:"How do you feel about Labor Knesset members Avraham Burg and Yossi Beilin going to South Africa to meet with Palestinian Authority representatives during the Presidential Peace Retreat on the Middle East (which ended the day before)?"

Sharon answered, "The problem is, people can pretend they represent the State of Israel. But they are on their own. They only represent themselves. They create false expectations. Israeli citizens should demonstrate more self control."

REPORTER:"Do you think you kept your campaign promise and brought peace and security?

"We have fought Arab terror for 120 years. I'm making the effort," Sharon said. "It depends not only on us. We don't see the slightest effort on the other side."

REPORTER:"Why should the Palestinians stop their struggle against the occupation when you refuse to speak with their chosen leader?"

Sharon replied, "We aren't interfering with their leaders. I don't think that Mr. Arafat is looking for peace. At Camp David, he would have gotten more than anyone thought an Israeli Prime Minister (Ehud Barak at the time) would give. And he turned it down.

Sharon added, "No Israeli Prime Minister will give him this much in the future. Arafat rejected it and embarked on a strategy of terror.

"Compared to the United States, Israeli casualties proportionally are as if we have suffered 13,000 killed and 117,000 injured since the intifada broke out in September 2000.

"And at some point, Arafat has to stop causing suffering to his own people. Until he takes certain steps, we can't negotiate."

Sharon then listed these steps:

1. Arrest terrorists "seriously," and not run them through a revolving door.

2. Dismantle the terror organizations.

3. Collect illegal weapons and hand them to American representatives to be taken out of the Palestinian Authority area.

4. Stop incitement "Once he takes these steps," the Prime Minister said, "We'll be ready to negotiate. So long as there's terror, we can't negotiate.

He added, "The sooner they understand this, the sooner we can have peace. We accepted the (American) Tenet and Mitchell Plans.

"I think we, Israelis, understand peace and want peace more than any other nation in the world."

Sharon is almost 74. He feels he accomplished a lot in his career, but one goal remains.

"I want to reach a settlement between Israel and the Palestinians. Then I can go back to my farm.

"But Palestinians don't understand that peace can be as painful as war. You have to make painful concessions.

"Israelis are more and more disillusioned over the Palestinians. It gets harder to reach a settlement, but I think I can do it."