Ariel Sharon: Making a Difference Introduction

My thesis for this paper is that Ariel Sharon was one of the most important figures in Israel’s history and, despite the controversy surrounding him, he has had a profound effect on the current nature and state of Israel today. He has been in the Israeli military as an officer and fought in many of Israel's major wars. After his military career was over, he entered into the realm of politics where he occupied countless different posts on his way to becoming the Israeli Prime Minister. Though many of his decisions were controversial, he has undoubtedly had a great effect on the way that Israel is today. That is why I chose to do this project on him - for better or for worse, he has most definitely had a lasting impact on Israel and the world.

Ariel Sharon: Essay

Though Ariel Sharon is known predominantly as an Israeli Prime Minister, his service to his nation was far greater than a single position. Throughout his life, Sharon served his country as a soldier, officer, as well as countless political positions in addition to being a Prime Minister. Though he is known throughout the world as a very controversial figure, this controversy does not detract from the fact that Ariel Sharon has served his nation dutifully and wholeheartedly, doing everything within his power to establish Israel as a legitimate nation in the eyes of the world.

Ariel Sharon was born Ariel Scheinermann on February 26, 1928 to parents Shmuel and Dvora Scheinermann in Kfar Malal, which was located in what was at the time the British Mandate of Palestine. (Ariel Sharon, jewishvirtuallibrary) His parents had immigrated to Palestine years earlier as a result of the Russian Revolution and the ensuing chaos caused by the Red Army, which would have posed a great threat to them had they remained in Russia. (Ariel Sharon, mfa) By the age of ten, Sharon had already become a member of Hadassah, a youth Zionist movement for those dedicated to the formation of a Jewish state. By the time he was 14, Sharon had joined Gadna, a military youth battalion, and would eventually go on to join the Haganah, which was the precursor to the modern day Israel Defense Forces. (Biography of Ariel Sharon)

After Israel’s creation as an official nation in 1948, the Haganah evolved into the Israel Defense Forces and Sharon became a platoon commander in the Alexandroni Brigade. (Ariel Sharon, mfa) In the War of 1948, Sharon suffered a brutal groin injury while in combat against the Jordanian Arab Legion in the Battle of Latrun, an

unsuccessful attempt to relieve a besieged Jerusalem. (Dan, 54) After his wound had healed completely almost three years later, Sharon was asked to return to service as a Major in charge of the new Unit 101, Israel’s first Special Forces unit. This unit was utilized in military raids against Palestine as well as other neighboring Arab nations, and was especially famous for killing civilians. (Dan, 62) Perhaps the most well known incident of this was the Qibya Massacre, in which Sharon and his troops killed 69 Palestinian civilians as retribution for an earlier attack. (Kimmerling, 89) Not long afterwards, Unit 101 merged into the 890 Paratroopers Brigade, of which Sharon was made commander. (Ariel Sharon, jewishvirtuallibrary)

In the Suez War of 1956, Sharon’s role was to command Unit 202 (a paratroopers brigade) in taking and securing Sinai’s Mitla Pass. (Biography of Ariel Sharon) Before assaulting the pass itself, Sharon sent a reconnaissance team to scout the region and locate the position of the enemy. This force met with heavy resistance and was eventually trapped as a result of vehicular malfunction; consequently, Sharon sent the rest of his men into the pass to save the team, losing 38 men in the process. (Ariel Sharon, mfa) As the Egyptians were expected to leave their positions in the pass within a day or two of the attack, the attack itself was considered reckless by many of Sharon’s superiors, and Sharon’s reputation as a commander was tarnished as a result. (Biography of Ariel Sharon)

Several years after the Mitla incident when Yitzhak Rabin became the Chief of Staff, Sharon once again began to rapidly rise through the ranks until he eventually achieved the rank of Aluf, or Major General. (Kimmerling, 156) In the Six-Day War Sharon was put in charge of the most powerful armored division on the Sinai front, eventually leading this unit to break through the Kusseima-Abu-Ageila fortified area – a breakthrough which largely contributed to Israel’s swift victory. (Ariel Sharon, jewishvirtuallibrary) Sharon was called back into service along with his armored division during the Yom Kippur War, in which he encircled the Egyptian Third Army at Suez, tipping the war in Israel’s favor. (Sharon, 86) However, in 1974, just a year after leading his forces to victory at Suez, Ariel Sharon was relieved of duty for his aggressive political positions. (Kimmerling, 187)

Sharon’s political career began to blossom in June of 1975, when he served as an aide to the Prime Minister at the time Yitzhak Rabbin. By 1977, he had started his own party called the Shlomtzion and won two seats in the Knesset (the Israeli Parliament) that year. (Sharon, 113) After the elections, he merged his own party with the right-center political party Likud, becoming the nation’s Minister of Agriculture in the Process. (Sharon, 115) Four years later, in 1981, Sharon’s efforts greatly helped the Likud Party to retain control in the Knesset and Sharon was subsequently rewarded the position of the Minister of Defense. (Kimmerling, 214)

It was as the Minister of Defense that Sharon found himself in yet another controversy. During the Lebanon War of 1982, between 800 and 3,500 Palestinian refugees were killed by Lebanese Maronite Christian militias which Sharon had sent into the Palestinian refugee camps. After word of the incident, which would come to be known as the Sabra and Shatila massacres, was leaked to the press, many people believed that Sharon was either partly or fully responsible for this tragedy. Consequently, Sharon was forced to resign from his position, though he by no means left the political arena.

After his controversy involving the massacres, Sharon continued to be involved in Israeli politics, occupying positions from Minister without Portfolio (a government minister who has no specific duties regarding his position) to Foreign Minister. He also served as the Minister for Trade and Industry, the Minister of Housing Construction, as well as Minister of National Infrastructure. In time, he was eventually able to overcome the problems with his public image after the massacres and became the leader of the Liked Party.

It was as the leader of the Likud Party when Sharon had his largest influence on his nation and on this world. In the elections of 2001, Sharon won the position of Israeli Prime Minister as the leader of the Likud Party. His main goal as Prime Minister was a unilateral withdrawal of Israeli settlers in Israel’s Gaza Strip, an action which was deemed necessary to eventually succeed in the United States’ Road Map for Peace, a proposal which brought forth the idea of the eventual creation of a Palestinian state. (Kimmerling, 240) This idea, just as Sharon himself, was extremely controversial. While many of Israel’s left wing political supporters found this to be an appealing idea, many of the more right-wing supporters, even amongst Sharon’s own Likud party, found this idea to be foolish; however, despite much political resistance, Sharon went forward with his proposition, controversially expelling 9,480 Jewish settlers from 21 Jewish settlements along the strip. As many of those in his own party resented Sharon’s position on the matter of the Gaza Strip, Sharon resigned as the lead of the Likud Party on November 21, 2005 to start his own party known as Kadima, meaning forward; however, his position as the head of Kadima was not to last for very long.

On December 18, 2005, not even a month after announcing the formation of Kadima, Sharon suffered a mild stroke. Though it was not severe, it incapacitated him enough so that he was forced to step down from his position temporarily. Unfortunately, this temporariness later evolved into permanence as he suffered a second, much more serious stroke on January 4, 2006. This stroke, which resulted in a large cerebral hemorrhage, eventually caused his doctors to place him in a medically induced coma. It is in this persistent vegetative state which Ariel Sharon continues to live to this day.

In Israeli history, Sharon stands tall as one of the most important political figures to grace the nation. Despite his controversial nature, Sharon performed tasks not only as a military leader, but as a statesman as well. Not only did he help a young Israel establish its independence and safety at one point in his career, but he later took on the task of guiding the still fledging nation during a very tumultuous time period. Though not every Israeli citizen, or world citizen for that matter, agrees that Ariel Sharon made the right decisions, one thing is certain: he made the decisions that he did without hesitance and with his nation’s best interests at heart.