Ariel Sharon Turns 80, Son Omri Goes to Jail
by Gil Ronen
(IsraelNN.com) Former Prime Minister Ariel Sharon turned 80 on Tuesday, more than two years after he was rendered comatose by a stroke.
Attorney Dov Weisglass, formerly Sharon's closest adviser, said there had been little change in his condition over the past year. He is breathing without the help of machines and his vital signs are good, so his current state could continue for some time. Sharon has undergone a series of subsequent surgeries related to his comatose state.
Regarding the possibility that Sharon will eventually emerge from his coma, Weisglass said, "I understand that the doctors are not optimistic."
Medical staff at Sheba Medical Center outside Tel Aviv regularly move Sharon to maintain circulation and avoid bed sores. His eyes often open involuntarily, and family members spend time at his side.
Sharon sniffing an etrog.
Omri doing time
Sharon's son, Omri, will enter jail Wednesday morning, and begin serving a seven month sentence for charges of falsification of corporate documents and illegal campaign financing. He visited his father's bed Tuesday and spoke with his friends.
Sharon is to turn himself in for jail time at the Tel Aviv magistrates' court, and will be placed in the court lockup cell together with other prisoners. The prisoners will then be transported to jail. Sharon will be spared the two-day processing stage in Ramle's Nitzan jail – which are considered to be nightmarish – and be sent directly to the relatively comfortable Ma'asiyahu jail, also in Ramle.
Life to date
Ariel Sharon was born Ariel Scheinerman on February 27, 1928, in Kfar Malal, to Lithuanian Jews Shmuel and Dvora Sheinerman. The family arrived in Israel before World War 1. They supported the dominant socialist party Mapai but refused to participate in Bolshevik-style public revilement rallies against the Revisionists following the murder of Labor politician Chaim Arlozorov. According to Sharon, his parents were then expelled from the local health clinic and the village synagogue. The farmers' cooperative truck wouldn't make deliveries to their farm nor collect produce.
In 1942 at the age of 14, Sharon 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 (IDF).
Sharon in Yom Kippur War.
War hero
As 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 in the 1948 War of Independence.
In the early 1950s he formed and led Unit 101, Israel's first Special Forces unit, which carried out a series of military raids against Arab targets that helped bolster Israel's morale and fortify its deterrent image. A few months after its founding, Unit 101 was merged into the 202nd Paratroopers
In the 1956 Suez War Sharon commanded the 202nd Brigade, and carried out an attack on the Mitla Pass in which 38 Israeli soldiers were killed. He was later criticized for recklessness in provoking an unnecessary battle.
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.
Demonstration against Sharon in Washington D.C., 2002.
He retired from the army and was instrumental in establishing the Likud party in July 1973. However, he was called back to the IDF at the start of the Yom Kippur War and assigned to command a reserve armored division. Sharon helped locate a breach between the Egyptian forces and thrust through it toward the Suez Canal. He violated orders from the head of Southern Command by exploiting this success to cut the supply lines of the Egyptian Third Army, bridging the Suez Canal and advancing to within 101 kilometers of Cairo, encircling the Egyptian Third Army. This move was regarded by many Israelis as the turning point of the war in the Sinai front.
Pro-Yesha politician
Before the 1977 elections Sharon formed his own list, Shlomtzion, which won two Knesset seats and merged with the Likud after the elections. Sharon became Minister of Agriculture.
During this time, Sharon supported the Gush Emunim movement and was viewed as the patron of the settlers' movement. He used his position to encourage the establishment of a network of Israeli settlements in Judea, Samaria and Gaza ("Yesha"), doubling the number of Jewish settlements in those regions during his tenure.
Many years later, Sharon told political activists: "Everybody has to move, run and grab as many (Judean) 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."
Sharon as Prime Minister with President George W. Bush
Sabra and Shatila
After the 1981 elections, Prime Minister Menachem Begin appointed him Minister of Defense.
During the 1982 Lebanon War, while Sharon was Defense minister, the Sabra and Shatila massacre took place. A judicial committee of inquiry in Israel found the IDF indirectly responsible for the massacre and charged Sharon with "personal responsibility." Sharon had to forfeit the post of defense minister but stayed in the cabinet as minister without portfolio.
After Binyamin Netanyahu lost the 1999 elections to Labor head Ehud Barak, Sharon became leader of the Likud.
Prime Minister
On September 28, 2000, Sharon and an escort of over 1,000 Israeli police officers visited the Temple Mount complex. Arabs responded used the event as an excuse to begin a campaign of murderous rioting on a massive scale, which had been planned in advance. Barak's government collapsed and Sharon was elected Prime Minister in February 2001. He launched Operation Defensive Shield against terrorists in Judea and Samaria and began planning and construction of the "security fence" in Judea and Samaria.
Sharon was allegedly involved in a corrupt deal known as the "Greek island affair" involving the purchase of an island near the coast of Athens for building a multimillion-dollar resort complex. The charges against Sharon were dropped in 2004.
Expulsion, 2005: 'Hamas terrorists will live here happily'
U-turn and Disengagement
In May 2003, Sharon endorsed the Road Map for Peace put forth by the United States, European Union, and Russia, and announced his commitment to the creation of a Palestinian state. According to journalistic investigations, Sharon's sudden change from hawk to extreme dove occurred as part of a deal between him and leftist elements in the judicial system and media, involving the dropping of corruption charges against him.
In January 2005 Sharon formed a national unity government that included representatives of Labor. Between August 16-30 2005, Sharon expelled 9,480 Jewish settlers from 21 settlements in Gaza and four communities in northern Samaria. Israeli soldiers bulldozed every settlement structure except for several former synagogues, which were later looted and burned by Arabs. The IDF then left Gaza. The retreat and expulsion were euphemistically referred to as "the Disengagement."
On November 21, 2005, Sharon resigned as head of Likud, and dissolved parliament to form a new party called Kadima ("Forward"). He suffered a massive stroke on January 4, 2006, and entered state of a permanent coma.
Following Sharon's incapacitation, Ehud Olmert replaced him as Kadima's leader.
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