Sharon puts Mideast future in flux

LONDON — Love him or hate him, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has been an undeniable fact of life in Middle Eastern politics and military affairs for nearly six decades. Bewildered Arabs and Israelis spent Thursday trying to fathom the region without him if a massive stroke forces him to step down.

The Middle East could face heightened instability and bloodshed without the stabilizing leadership of the 77-year-old prime minister, according to some analysts. But others said prospects for peace could be markedly improved with the exit of the self-proclaimed warrior, who was in critical condition after being hospitalized with a brain hemorrhage Wednesday.

Doctors said Sharon will be kept in a medically induced coma for up to three days to prevent further stroke damage.

In the Middle East, where events have been shaped for decades by a small group of fiery personalities, almost none have had the sustained political and military effect of Sharon. He is praised for his politically risky decision to order last summer's Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, but he is equally derided as an iron-fisted warmonger whose battlefield decisions since the 1950s helped provoke thousands of Arab deaths.

Israeli and Arab political observers said the effect of Sharon's expected departure was incalculable.

The political scene in Israel, where national parliamentary elections are set for March, was in turmoil Thursday. Polls suggested his new breakaway centrist party, Kadima, would struggle to survive an election without him as it competes against the left-center Labor party and the conservative Likud bloc, which was co-founded by Sharon.

Ehud Olmert, his deputy, convened an emergency Cabinet meeting Thursday as acting prime minister and is directing Kadima's election campaign in Sharon's absence. Although acquaintances described Olmert as friendly and outgoing, with 11 years' experience as mayor of Jerusalem, doubts remained about his ability to match Sharon's national stature.

"I think there's a big state of shock," said Jennifer Laszlo Mizrahi, president of the Israel Project, a political-analysis group based in Washington and Jerusalem.

Palestinians celebrated in the streets, although their leaders quietly worried that hard-liners could be revitalized in their calls for harsher security measures to fight Arab militants and force Palestinian moderates into negotiating painful territorial concessions.

The result, many observers said, could be many months of stalemate, if not bloodshed, as extremists on both sides attempt a resurgence. However, some Palestinians left open the prospect that the demise of such a divisive and controversial figure as Sharon could actually help reduce tensions.

"At the popular level, Sharon has been far and away the most hated Israeli official for the past several decades. On the whole, people will simply take delight that, from their perspective, he's no longer on the scene to torment them," said Mouin Rabbani, a Palestinian-affairs analyst for the International Crisis Group, a nongovernmental organization.

But among the Palestinian governing elite, Rabbani added, "there will be a short-term concern because Sharon, at the end of the day and whatever they thought of him, was a known quality. There's an element of stability that no longer exists" after his departure.

Complicating the situation for Palestinians is the collapse of security in the Gaza Strip and seeming inability of President Mahmoud Abbas to restrain militant groups.

"The Palestinians are now in a heightened state of instability, of genuine chaos bordering on anarchy and incipient disintegration," Rabbani said. "They're not in a position to exploit the room for maneuver that Sharon's demise theoretically provides them."

For Arabs, Sharon's expected departure is bittersweet. They blamed him for failing to intervene in 1982 as the commander of occupation forces around Beirut when Israeli troops allowed Lebanese militiamen to enter the Sabra and Chatilla refugee camps and massacre thousands of Palestinians.

Arabs also blamed Sharon for Israeli army massacres during a military campaign he commanded in the Sinai Peninsula in the 1956 war against Egypt. In September 2000, Sharon visited the site in Jerusalem revered by Jews as the Temple Mount, which also is home to one of the holiest sites in Islam. Massive protests erupted, and the second Palestinian intifada, or uprising, soon followed, in which thousands of Arabs and Jews were killed in military operations and terrorist attacks.

For Israelis, the top concern driving politics is security, according to Mizrahi of Israel Project. Not only are Israelis concerned about attacks from Palestinians, they are increasingly worried about Iran's purported attempts to obtain the technology to build nuclear weapons.

Heading into the March elections, Israeli politicians are likely to campaign with get-tough promises as a means of winning votes. Ironically, Mizrahi suggested, only the politicians with significant get-tough military credentials would be able to continue Sharon's risky strategy of calling for more settlement withdrawals from the West Bank.

Information from The Associated Press is included in this report.