Comprehensive information and links about Ariel Sharon

Ariel Sharon For more detail of Sharon's recent illness, see Illnesses of Ariel Sharon; for an overview, see Health problems. (Hebrew: אריאל "אריק" שרון) (born February 27, 1928Ariel Sharon is the eleventh and current Prime Minister of Israel, serving since February 2001. Since January 4, 2006, Sharon has been incapacitated by the effects of a massive hemorrhagic stroke.

A long-serving Israeli political and military leader, Sharon was a founding member and former head of the Likud party, and previously served for over thirty years in the Israeli Defense Forces, rising to the rank of Major General, and achieving fame within Israel for his actions in the 1967 Six Day War and the 1973 Yom Kippur War. In late 2005, he broke from Likud which he helped form and founded a new party, Kadima, which is currently garnering support through public campaigns in anticipation of the election of a new Knesset in March 2006. It is the first time in recent Israeli history that the Knesset race is between three major parties (Kadima, Likud, and Labor) as opposed to the usual two (Likud and Labor).

Sharon has been a highly controversial figure, both in and outside Israel. Supporters view him as a leader who strove to establish peace without sacrificing Israel's security. Many Israelis consider him a war hero who helped defend the country during some of its greatest struggles. Some critics refer to him as "the Butcher of Beirut" and have sought to prosecute him as a war criminal for alleged crimes related to the Sabra and Shatila massacre during the 1982 Lebanon War, for which the Kahan Commission held him indirectly responsible.

On January 4, 2006, Sharon suffered a massive hemorrhagic stroke, was declared "temporarily incapable of discharging his powers", and Ehud Olmert, the Deputy Prime Minister, was officially confirmed as the Acting Prime Minister of Israel. Sharon is currently undergoing medical treatment; see Health problems.

On February 2 Sharon's Kadima party issued its ticket for the March elections to the Knesset. Since Sharon was unable to sign a nomination form, he is not a candidate and will thus cease to be a Knesset member in March. This means that even if his medical condition improves, he will be unable to continue as Prime Minister.

table February 27, 1928 to Shmuel and Dvora (formerly Vera), immigrants from Russia. They arrived in the Second Aliyah and settled in a socialist and secular community, where they, despite being Mapai supporters, were known to be contrarians against the prevailing community consensus:

dlThe Scheinermans' eventual ostracism... followed the 1933 Arlozorov murder when Dvora and Shmuel refused to endorse the Labor movement's anti-Revisionist calumny and participate in Bolshevi(k)- public revilement rallies, then the order of the day. Retribution was quick to come. They were expelled from the local health-fund clinic and village synagogue. The cooperative's truck wouldn't make deliveries to their farm nor collect produce.

In 1942 at the age of 14, he joined the Gadna, a paramilitary youth battalion, and later the Haganah, the underground paramilitary force and the Jewish military precursor to the Israel Defense Forces. At the creation of Israel (and Haganah's transformation into the Israel Defense Forces), Sharon was a platoon commander in the Alexandroni Brigade. Sharon was severely wounded in the groin by the Jordanian Arab Legion in the Second Battle of Latrun, an unsuccessful attempt to relieve the besieged Jewish community of Jerusalem. His injuries eventually healed.

In September 1949, he was promoted to company commander (of the Golani Brigade's reconnaissance unit) and in 1950 to intelligence officer for Central Command. He then took leave to begin studies of history and Middle Eastern culture at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. A year and a half later, he was asked to return to active service in the rank of major and as the leader of the new Unit 101, Israel's first special forces unit.

Unit 101 undertook a series of retaliatory raids against Palestinians and neighboring Arab states that helped bolster Israeli morale and fortify its deterrent image. However, the unit was also known for targeting civilians as well as Arab soldiers, notably in the widely condemned Qibya operation in the fall of 1953, in which 69 Palestinian civilians, half of which were women and children, were killed by Sharon's troops in a reprisal attack on their West Bank village. The Palestinians were killed inside their own homes, in what was Sharon's first known attack against civilian populations. In the documentary "Israel and the Arabs: 50 Year War" Ariel Sharon recalls what happened after the raid, which was heavily condemned by many countries in the West, including the U.S.:

dlI was summoned to see Ben-Gurion. It was the first time I met him, and right from the start Ben-Gurion said to me: "Let me first tell you one thing: it doesn't matter what the world says about Israel, it doesn't matter what they say about us anywhere else. The only thing that matters is that we can exist here on the land of our forefathers. And unless we show the Arabs that there is a high price to pay for murdering Jews, we won't survive."

Shortly afterwards, just a few months after its founding, Unit 101 was merged into the 202nd Paratroopers Brigade (Sharon eventually became the latter's commander), which continued to attack military and civilian targets, culminating with the attack on Qalqilyah police station in autumn 1956.

Sharon has been widowed twice. Shortly after becoming a military instructor, he married his first wife, Margalith, with whom he had a son, Gur. Margalith died in a car accident in 1962. Their son, Gur, died in October 1967 after a friend shot him while they were playing with the elder Sharon's rifle. [2] [3] [4] After Margalith's death, Sharon married her younger sister, Lily. They had two sons, Omri and Gil'ad. Lily Sharon died in 2000.

Mitla incident

In the 1956 Suez War (the British "Operation Musketeer"), Sharon commanded the 202nd Brigade and was responsible for taking ground east of the Sinai's Mitla Pass and eventually taking the pass itself. Having successfully carried out the first part of his mission (joining a battalion paratrooped near Mitla with the rest of the brigade moving on ground), Sharon's unit was deployed near the pass. Neither reconnaissance aircraft nor scouts reported enemy forces inside the Mitla Pass. Sharon, whose forces were initially heading east, away from the pass, reported to his superiors that he was increasingly concerned with the possibility of an enemy thrust through the pass, which could attack his brigade from the flank or the rear.

Sharon asked for permission to attack the pass several times but his requests were denied although he was allowed to check its status so that if the pass was empty, he could receive permission to take it later. Sharon sent a small scout force which was met with heavy fire and became bogged down due to vehicle malfunction in the middle of the pass. Sharon ordered the rest of his troops to attack in order to aid their comrades. In the ensuing successful battle to capture the pass thirty-eight Israeli soldiers were killed. Sharon was not only criticized by his superiors, he was damaged by revelations several years later by several former subordinates (one of IDF's first major revelations to the press), who claimed that Sharon tried to provoke the Egyptians and sent out the scouts in bad faith, ensuring that a battle would ensue. Deliberate or not, the attack was considered strategically reckless because the Egyptian forces were expected to withdraw from the pass in the following one or two days.

Main articles: Six-Day War and Yom Kippur War

The Mitla incident hindered Sharon's military career for several years. In the meantime, he occupied the position of an infantry brigade commander and received a law degree from Tel Aviv University. When Yitzhak Rabin (who within a few years became associated with the Labour Party) became Chief of Staff in 1962, however, Sharon began again to rise rapidly in the ranks, occupying the positions of Infantry School Commander and Head of Army Training Branch, eventually achieving the rank of Major General (). In the 1967 Six-Day War, Sharon commanded the most powerful armored division on the Sinai front which made a breakthrough in the Kusseima-Abu-Ageila fortified area. In 1969, he was appointed the Head of IDF's Southern Command. He had no further promotions before retiring in August 1973. Soon after, he joined the right-wing Likud political party.[5]

Sharon' s military career was not over, however. At the start of the Yom Kippur War on October 6, 1973, Sharon was called back to duty and assigned to command a reserve armored division. His forces did not engage the Egyptian Army immediately but it was Sharon who helped locate a breach between the Egyptian forces, which he then exploited by capturing a bridgehead on October 16 and throwing a bridge across the Suez Canal the following day. He violated his orders from the head of Southern Command by exploiting this success to cut the supply lines of the Egyptian Third Army, located to the south of the canal crossing, isolating it from other Egyptian units.

The divisions of Sharon and Abraham Adan (Bren) passed over this bridge into Africa advancing to within 101 kilometers of Cairo. They wreaked havoc on the supply lines of the Third Army stretching to the south of them, cutting off and encircling the Third Army, but could not force its surrender before the cease-fire. Tensions between the two generals followed his decision, but a military tribunal later found his action was militarily effective. This move was regarded by many Israelis as the turning point of the war in the Sinai front. Thus, Sharon is viewed by some as a war hero who saved Israel from defeat in Sinai. A photo of Sharon wearing a head bandage on the Suez Canal became a famous symbol of Israeli military prowess.

Sharon's aggressive political positions were controversial and he was relieved of duty in February 1974.

During the 1982 Lebanon War, while Ariel Sharon was Defense minister, the Sabra and Shatila massacre took place, in which between 460 and 3,500 Palestinian civilians in the refugee camps were killed by Lebanese Christian forces under the command of Lebanese Maronite Phalange militia. The Security Chief of the Phalange militia, Elie Hobeika, was the ground commander of the militiamen who entered the Palestinian camps and killed the Palestinians. The Phalange had been sent into the camps to clear out PLO fighters, and Israeli forces had been sent to the camps at Sharon's command to provide them with logistical support and to guard camp exits.

The Kahan Commission claimed that "absolutely no direct responsibility devolves upon Israel or upon those who acted in its behalf." Yet it did charge Sharon with "personal responsibility." It recommended in early 1983 the removal of Sharon from his post as Defense minister. In their recommendations and closing remarks, the commission stated:

dlWe have found, as has been detailed in this report, that the Minister of Defense [Ariel Sharon] bears personal responsibility. In our opinion, it is fitting that the Minister of Defense draw the appropriate personal conclusions arising out of the defects revealed with regard to the manner in which he discharged the duties of his office - and if necessary, that the Prime Minister consider whether he should exercise his authority under Section 21-A(a) of the Basic Law: the Government, according to which "the Prime Minister may, after informing the Cabinet of his intention to do so, remove a minister from office."

Nevertheless the Kahan Commission did not interview Palestinian survivors of the massacre.

Journalist Robert Fisk, following some eyewitness accounts and his own investigations, allege that Ariel Sharon and the Israeli Army bear a greater responsibility in the massacre.

An AP report on 15 September 1982 stated:

dlDefence Minister Ariel Sharon, in a statement, tied the killing [of the Phalangist leader Gemayel] to the PLO, saying: "It symbolises the terrorist murderousness of the PLO terrorist organisations and their supporters." Habib Chartouni, a Lebanese Christian from the Syrian Socialist National Party confessed to the murder of Gemayel, and no Palestinians were involved. Sharon had used this to instigate the entrance of the Lebanese militias into the camps.

Sharon was dismissed by Prime Minister Menachem Begin but he remained in successive governments as a Minister.

In 1987, magazine published a story implying Sharon was directly responsible for the massacres. Sharon sued won the suit in the U.S. court because although the jury found the article false and defamatory, Sharon could not establish that had "acted out of malice," as required under the U.S. law. [8]

On June 18, 2001, relatives of the victims of the Sabra massacre began proceedings in Belgium to have Ariel Sharon indicted on war crimes charges [9]. In June 2002, a Brussels Appeals Court rejected the lawsuit because the law was subsequently changed under heavy U.S. pressure to disallow such lawsuits unless a Belgian citizen is involved. [10] (original: [11])

Beliefs

Sharon was an ardent opponent of certain Israeli peace efforts with Arabs. Yet, he also has endorsed other peace efforts. He voted against the peace treaty with Egypt in 1979. He voted against a withdrawal from southern Lebanon in 1985. He opposed Israel's participation in the Madrid peace conference in 1991. He opposed the Knesset plenum vote on the Oslo agreement in 1993. He abstained on a vote for peace with Jordan in 1994. He voted against the Hebron agreement in 1997. He condemned the manner of Israel's retreat from Lebanon in 2000. On the other hand, as Prime Minister, Sharon signed on to the Road Map peace plan, participated in the negotiations with the Palestinians leading to the Wye Agreement, turned the Gaza Strip over to Palestinian control, and openly endorsed a Palestinian state. [12]

When Sharon joined Begin's government he had relatively little political experience. He avoided Begin's Herut party in the 1940s and 1950s and seemed to be personally devoted to the ideals of Mapai, and then Labor. However, after retiring from military service, Sharon was instrumental in establishing the Likud in July 1973. The Likud was comprised of Herut, the Liberal Party and independent elements. Sharon became chairman of the campaign staff for the elections which were scheduled for November 1973. But two and a half weeks after the start of the election campaign, the Yom Kippur War erupted and Sharon was called back to reserve service (). In December 1973 Sharon was elected to the Knesset, but a year later he tired of political life and resigned.

From June 1975 to March 1976, Sharon was a special aide to Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin. With the 1977 elections near, Sharon tried to return to the Likud and replace Menachem Begin at the head of the party. He suggested to Simcha Ehrlich, who headed the Liberal Party bloc in the Likud, that he was more fitting than Begin to win an election victory; but he was rejected. Following this he tried to join the Labour Party and the centrist DASH, but was rejected in those parties too. Only then did he form his own list, Shlomtzion, which won only two Knesset seats in the subsequent elections. Immediately after the elections he merged Shlomtzion with the Likud and became Minister of Agriculture.

During this period, Sharon supported the Gush Emunim settlements movement and was viewed as the patron of the messianic settlers' movement. He used his position to encourage the establishment of a network of Israeli settlements in the occupied territories to prevent the possibility of the return of these territories to Palestinian Arabs. Sharon doubled the number of Jewish settlements on the West Bank and Gaza Strip during his tenure.

On his settlement policy, Sharon said while addressing a meeting of the Tsomet Party: "Every has to move, run and grab as many (Palestinian) hilltops as they can to enlarge the (Jewish) settlements because everything we take now will stay ours... Everything we don't grab will go to them." (Agence France Presse, Nov. 15, 1998.)

After the 1981 elections, Begin rewarded Sharon for his important contribution to Likud's narrow win, by appointing him Minister of Defense. ()

After being dismissed from the Defense Minister post because the Kahan Commission found him "personally responsible" for his "disregard of the danger of a massacre," Sharon remained in successive governments as a Minister without portfolio (1983–1984), Minister for Trade and Industry (1984–1990), and Minister for Housing Construction (1990–1992). During this period he was a rival to then prime minister Yitzhak Shamir, but failed in various bids to replace him as chairman of the ruling Likud party. Their rivalry reached a head on the "Night of Microphones" in February 1990, when Sharon snapped the microphone from Shamir, who was addressing the Likud central committee, and famously exclaimed: "Who's for wiping out terrorism?". The implication was that only Sharon knew how to destroy the scourge and whoever deemed this as important should support him. The incident was widely viewed as an apparent putsch attempt against Shamir's leadership of the party.

In Benjamin Netanyahu's 1996–1999 government, he was Minister of National Infrastructure (1996–1998), and Foreign Minister (1998–1999). Upon the election of the Barak Labor government, Sharon became leader of the Likud party. After the collapse of Barak's government, he was elected Prime Minister in February 2001.

The Greek island affair involves attempts by David Appel to purchase an island near the coast of Athens for the purpose of building a multimillion-dollar resort complex. While Ariel Sharon was Foreign Minister under Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in 1999, Appel contracted to pay his Sharon's son, Gilad, then 30 years old and a business novice, $20,000 monthly as a business consultant. According to reports, Gilad might have received up to $3 million had the project been successful. Police believe Appel signed the contract with Gilad Sharon in order to secure his father's help in facilitating the resort project. Sharon later hosted the deputy foreign minister of Greece during his visit to Israel. Appel is widely suspected of bribing Ehud Olmert, the former mayor of Jerusalem into helping him by funding an official banquet held for the Athenian mayor. In return for the aid received from both Likud leaders, Appel allegedly contributed to the campaigns of both men when they ran for chairman of the Likud after Netanyahu's resignation in 1999. On June 14, 2004, Israel's Attorney General, Meni Mazouz, decided to close the case due to lack of evidence and prosecutorial misconduct.

According to the Palestinians, Ariel Sharon has followed an aggressive policy of non-negotiation. Palestinians allege that the al-Aqsa Intifada (September 2000–February 2005) was sparked by a visit by Sharon and an escort of several hundred policemen to the Haram al-SharifTemple Mount complex, site of the Dome of the Rock and al-Aqsa Mosque. Sharon's visit, prior to his election as Prime Minister, came after archeologists claimed that extensive building operations at the site were destroying priceless antiquities and a few months before the election. While visiting the site, Sharon declared that the complex would remain under perpetual Israeli control. Palestinian commentators accused Sharon of purposely inflaming emotions with the event to provoke a violent response and obstruct success of delicate ongoing peace talks.

Sharon's supporters claim that Yasser Arafat and the Palestinian Authority planned the intifada. [13] [14] [15] [16]. They state that Palestinian security chief Jabril Rajoub provided assurances that if Sharon did not enter the mosques, no problems would arise. They also often quote statements by Palestinian Authority officials, particularly Imad Falouji, the P.A. Communications Minister, who admitted months after Sharon's visit that the violence had been planned in July, far in advance of Sharon's visit, stating the intifada "was carefully planned since the return of (Palestinian President) Yasser Arafat from Camp David negotiations rejecting the U.S. conditions."[17][18] According to the Mitchell Report, the government of Israel asserted that

The Mitchell Report, based on a subsequent investigation, also found that the Sharon visit did not cause the Al-Aqsa Intifada, though it was poorly timed and would clearly have a provocative effect.[19]

Palestinians doubt the existence of popular support for Sharon's actions. Polls published in the media, as well as the 140% call-up of reservists (as opposed to the 60% in regular periods) seem to indicate that the Israeli public is quite supportive of Sharon's policies. A survey conducted by Tel Aviv University's Jaffe Center in May 2004 found that 80% of Jewish Israelis believe that the Israel Defense Forces have succeeded in militarily countering the Al-Aqsa Intifada, [20] indicating widespread faith in Sharon's hard-line policy.

On July 20, 2004, Sharon called on French Jews to emigrate from France to Israel immediately, in light of an increase in French anti-Semitism (94 anti-Semitic assaults reported in the first six months of 2004 compared to 47 in 2003). France has the third largest Jewish population (about 600,000 people), after the United States and Israel. Sharon claimed that an "unfettered anti-Semitism" reigned in France. The French government responded by describing his comments as "unacceptable", as did the French representative Jewish organization CRIF, which denied Sharon's claim of intense anti-Semitism in French society. An Israeli spokesperson later claimed that Sharon had been misunderstood. France then postponed a visit by Sharon. Upon his visit, both Sharon and Chirac were described as showing a willingness to put the issue behind them.

On July 26, 2005, Israeli attorney general Menachem Mazuz announced that he would indict Sharon's son, Omri, on charges of corruption. Omri had parliamentary immunity at the time, but indicated willingness to stand trial. The Knesset passed a law limiting members' immunity in order to allow the indictment and Omri was formally indicted on August 28.

While some believe that his recent efforts have been damaging to the peace process, he has embarked on a risky course of unilateral withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, while maintaining control of its coastline and airspace. It has been welcomed by both the Palestinian Authority and the left-wing in Israel, as well as by many abroad, including the United States and the European Union, as a step towards a final peace settlement. However, it has been greeted with opposition from within his own Likud party and from other right-wing Israelis, on security, military, and religious grounds. Other detractors have publicly distrusted Sharon's motives for this plan, and their suspicions were further roused after publication of an interview with top Sharon aide Dov Weisglass in the Israeli newspaper on October 8, 2004, in which he explained Israel's motivation for withdrawing from Gaza. He told the newspaper that both Israel and the US felt Palestinian terrorism must end before a political process leading to a Palestinian state begins. Otherwise, Weisglass said, "the result would be a Palestinian state with terrorism..." The Gaza withdrawal would allow Israel to delay negotiations, and a Palestinian state, until such time that their leadership abandons violence. Critics interpreted Weisglass' comments as saying the purpose of disengagement was to destroy Palestinian aspirations for a state for years to come. This incident has bolstered the position of critics that Sharon is intentionally trying to destroy the peace process, an accusation denied by the Prime Minister's camp.

On December 1, 2004, Sharon dismissed five ministers from the Shinui party for voting against the government's 2005 budget. In January 2005 Sharon formed a national unity government that included representatives of Likud, Labour, and Meimad and Degel HaTorah as "out-of-government" supporters without any seats in the government (Haredi parties usually reject having ministerial offices as a policy). Between August 16 and August 30, 2005, Sharon controversially expelled 8,500 Jewish settlers from 21 settlements in Gaza. Once it became clear that the evictions were definitely going ahead a group of extreme right-wing Rabbis, led by Rabbi Yosef Dayan placed an ancient curse on him calling on the Angel of Death to intervene and kill him. After Israeli soldiers bulldozed every settlement structure except for several former synagogue buildings, Israeli soldiers formally left Gaza on Sunday, September 11, 2005 and closed the border fence at Kissufim. The synagogues were later looted and burned to the ground by miscreants. While his decision to withdraw from Gaza sparked bitter protests from far-right members of the Likud party and the settler movement, opinion polls showed that it was a popular move among most of the Israeli electorate. On September 27, 2005, Sharon narrowly defeated a leadership challenge by a 52-48% vote. The move was initiated within the central committee of the governing Likud party by his main rival, Binyamin Netanyahu, who had left the cabinet to protest Sharon's withdrawal from Gaza. The measure was an attempt by Netanyahu to call an early primary in November 2005 to choose the party's leader.

On November 21, 2005, Sharon resigned as head of Likud, and dissolved parliament to form a new centre-right party called ("Forward").[21] November polls indicated that Sharon was likely to be returned to the prime ministership.[22] On December 20, 2005, Sharon's longtime rival Binyamin Netanyahu was elected his successor as leader of Likud [23]. Netanyahu, along with Labor's Amir Peretz, are to be

Sharon was hospitalized on December 18, 2005 after reportedly suffering a minor ischemic stroke[24], specifically, a relatively unusual type of stroke called a paradoxical embolism, in which a clot from the venous circulation crosses over into the arterial circulation through a hole between the right and left atrium called a patent foramen ovale or an atrial septal defect and goes to the brain, causing a transient speech and motor disturbance. Sharon spent four days in the hospital, released on December 20. During his hospital stay, Sharon was also diagnosed with a minor hole in his heart and was scheduled to undergo a cardiac catheterization to fill the hole in his atrial septum on January 5, 2006 [25].

On January 4, 2006, 22:50 Israel Time (UTC+2), Sharon suffered a massive hemorrhagic stroke, with bleeding in the brain, and was evacuated by ambulance from his ranch, Havat Hashikmim, which is in the Negev region, to Hadassah hospital, Jerusalem, to undergo brain surgery.

Although Sharon was reported to be in stable condition, his doctors called this stroke "significant", adding that he "suffered a cerebral hemorrhage," which is bleeding in the brain. Sharon underwent seven hours of surgery[26] to stop the bleeding and drain the accumulated blood. Hadassah director, Professor Shlomo Mor-Yosef, reported at 14:00 Israel Time, following the seven-hour surgery, that the bleeding had stopped: "all the parameters are according to expectations after an operation of this type." The doctors estimated his chances for recovery as being "very low." Sharon is currently recovering from his surgery in the hospital's intensive care unit, and is reported to be in critical (life-threatening) but stable condition. Earlier in the day, members of the media incorrectly reported that Sharon had died, after doctors at the hospital were prepared to announce his death. However, they were convinced by family and advisors to try, once again, to save his life. The extreme graveness of his situation has led some to say that his chance of survival may be extremely slim. "The complications, outside experts said, are life-threatening and make the prospect of survival still slimmer." [27]

On the night of Sharon's stroke, in the wake of his serious illness, and following consultations between Government Secretary Israel Maimon and Attorney General Meni Mazouz, the Prime Minister was declared "temporarily incapable of discharging his powers", and Ehud Olmert, the Deputy Prime Minister, was officially confirmed as the Acting Prime Minister of Israel. Olmert and the Cabinet have announced that the elections will take place on March 28 as scheduled. According to Israeli law, an Acting Prime Minister can remain in office 100 days after Prime Minister became permanently incapacitated before the President has to appoint a new Prime Minister. Sharon has not yet been declared permanently incapacitated and, regardless, with the next general elections being March 28, 2006, the question of long-term prime ministerial succession will be resolved in the ballot.

In the early morning of January 5, it was reported that Sharon is not expected to fully recover, and may be partially paralyzed. [28] Another surgery was undertaken. On January 6, 17:50 Israeli Time, Mor-Yosef reported "significant improvement" in the reduction of intracranial pressure which was threatening to do further damage. Sharon's condition remains "stable, but still critical". On Friday, January 6, 2006 additional bleeding was detected in Sharon's brain. A third surgery was performed to try to stop this additional bleeding.

On Saturday, January 7, 2006 Sharon, unconscious and clinging to life, was in stable condition. According to one of his surgeons, Dr. Jose Cohen, his chances for survival are "very high," but he likely will suffer some cognitive impairment[29]. Channel 2 TV quoted Dr. Cohen as saying he was "quite optimistic" about Sharon's chances of survival, but "to say after such a severe trauma as this that there will be no cognitive problems is simply not to recognize reality."

On the morning of January 9, Mor-Yosef reported that doctors have begun the procedure of bringing Sharon out of a medically-induced coma, a process expected to last several days.

On Tuesday January 10, 2006 Sharon showed "slight improvement" in his recovery from a massive stroke by moving his left hand, but doctors said they still could not assess his abilities to think and reason as they gradually reduce the anesthesia keeping him in a coma.[30].

On January 11, 2006, his neurosurgeon Dr Felix Umansky reported that a complete assessment of any brain damage sustained was still months off. It was indicated that Sharon was responding to pain stimulus in both sides of his and had begun to breathe independently. However, he was still not responding to verbal stimulus, namely being addressed by his name (The Age, 2006).

On January 12, Haaretz reported that eighty percent of patients who suffered this type of stroke (called the hemorrhagic stroke), die within a month. Sharon's anesthesiologist, Dr. Yoram Weiss, stated that Sharon is not currently facing an immediate threat to his life.

On January 13, Sharon remained in a coma, and was being weaned off sedatives, according to Steven Gutkin of the Associated Press. According to Dr. Nick Ward, a neurologist at London's University College mentioned in Gutkin's article, the prognosis was very weak. Ward commented that Sharon would probably not return to normal. However, Maurizio Miglietta, chief of Trauma and Critical Care at NYU Medical Center, said it is not uncommon for patients in Sharon's situation not to wake up for a week or even two weeks.[31]

On January 14, hospital sources said that, while tests have shown activity on both sides of his brain, doctors tending to Sharon were concerned that the Israeli prime minister had not shown signs of emerging from a coma, and that it might take longer than hoped for him to regain consciousness (Reuters UK[32], BBC World Service[33]).

On January 15, the Hadassah Hospital annouced that Sharon successfully underwent a tracheotomy in the evening to help wean him off a respirator as he lies in a coma.[34].

On January 16, it was reported by his family that Sharon opened his eyes briefly after hearing a sound recording of his grandson's voice. Physicians at Jerusalem’s Hadassah Ein Kerem Hospital denied the eye-opening incident, insisting that Sharon's condition remains serious without yet any positive sign of medical significance.

By January 25, Sharon had shown response to pain stimulus, but had shown no signs of awaking from his coma despite having been off sedatives for more than a week. The Israeli daily quoted experts describing Sharon's condition as a vegetative state, saying he could still wake up, but it might take weeks or months. [35]

Report of the Commission of Inquiry into the events at the refugee camps in Beirut - 8 February 1983Ruling from the Belgian Court of Appeals (12 February 2003). Taken from International Campaign for Justice for the Victims of Sabra Pity the Nation: Lebanon at War (3rd ed. 2001). London: Oxford University Press; 727 pages. ISBN 0192801309The Great War for Civilisation - The Conquest of the Middle East; (October 2005) London. Fourth Estate, 1168 pages. ISBN 184115007XPhonecall - An authentic recording of Ariel Sharon talking to a soldier positioned at one of the Suez Channel bunkers at the beginning of the Yom Kippur War.