Sharon still heads a minority government in Israel. But the chances of Labour rescuing him daily increase, reports Graham Usher from Jerusalem "With this coalition I can't go far," mumbled Ariel Sharon on Monday. His minority government had just survived three no-confidence motions courtesy of the mass abstention by Israel's main opposition Labour Party and despite rebellious abstentions by five members of his Likud Party, including a minister and deputy minister. Israel's prime minister had vowed the day before to sack any cabinet member who flouted his government's decision to "disengage" from most of Gaza and four settlements in the West Bank. But of course Sharon could not sack the rebels, any more than he could his coalition partner the National Religious Party, three of whose members voted for the no confidence motion. Instead he is casting around for new partners and parties, with Labour the first among equals. Labour supports the disengagement plan and there are many among its parliament members who eagerly want to return to their ministerial chairs in a new National Unity government, including leader Shimon Peres. But, he says, "there will be no negotiations until we receive an official and formal invitation, which I would first bring to my party institutions". The invite is likely to arrive very soon. On Tuesday Israel's attorney-general, Menachem Mazuz, decided not to indict Sharon on charges of bribery in the so- called Greek Island affair, in which Sharon and his son Gilad had allegedly received bribes from an Israeli businessman in return for help with real estate deals in Greece and Israel. In March Israel's then State Prosecutor Edna Arbel recommended indictment. Mazuz ruled that not only was there "a lack of sufficient evidence" for an indictment but that "the evidence in this case does not bring us even remotely close to a reasonable possibility of conviction." As one Israeli commentator put it: "Even Sharon's advisers could not have drafted a more successful report from the prime minister's perspective." The decision clears the way to talks with Labour which had conditioned them on the bribery allegations being dropped. Negotiations on Labour joining the government will begin next week and, insists Labour chairwoman Dalia Itzik, from scratch. "Whatever was talked about so far has no value," she said on Tuesday. "If Sharon invites us to negotiate, we will set our own conditions and handle the negotiations in the open. I don't believe in secret talks. A thousand things can still stand in the way of a unity government." Other senior Labour figures, however, say "most of the details have been agreed upon" for Labour joining the coalition following "secret talks" in recent weeks between Sharon's people and Peres. "The problem," says one Labour Party source, "is that Sharon doesn't have a majority in the Likud Knesset [parliamentary] faction." Twelve of the 40 Likud members of parliament are not only opposed to the disengagement but also to Labour joining the government, preferring what they call an "ideological" coalition rather than a centrist one. Their immediate aim is to increase their numbers so as to block any Likud majority approving Labour's entry. Sharon's immediate aim is to whittle them down to size. Buoyed by Mazuz and high popularity ratings in the polls (including among Likud voters) the odds are Sharon will win this intra-party contest as he has won so many others. But it will take time. Most analysts see him heading a minority government until the parliamentary summer recess in August, with autumn the most propitious time for a new government of National Unity. In the meantime Sharon will consolidate Israel's hold on the West Bank, always the sine qua non of the Gaza disengagement. On Monday Israel's Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz requested new plans for increased construction in Gush Etzion, Maale Adumim and Ariel, three vast settlement blocs that he and Sharon want to annex to Israel. Orders were also issued for the expropriation of 18,000 dunums (4,500 acres) of Palestinian land so that the latest segment of the West Bank barrier could be built to encircle Ariel, which lies some 20 kilometres inside the West Bank. Both decisions appear to violate "understandings" reached between Sharon and the Bush administration, triggering calls from the White House for "clarifications" on the two moves. But US opposition is likely to be less over substance than over conditions and timing. US officials quoted in Israel's Haaretz newspaper say while the US opposed any expansion beyond the settlement's existing "jurisdictions", it is open to discussions with Israel over "redefining the boundaries of all of the settlements in the West Bank". Similarly, while the US is averse to any link up till now between the Ariel barrier and other parts of the West Bank barrier, "contacts" over the issue could be "renewed" in early 2005. By which time Labour may be in Sharon's government, Bush may again be in the White House and Palestinians will be segregated from their lands, suburbs and livelihoods in a dozen more villages and towns in the West Bank.
