JERUSALEM, 9 August 2004 — The Labour Party moved closer to joining Ariel Sharon’s hard-line government after coalition talks yielded written agreement on key peacemaking issues, including a more detailed timetable for a Gaza withdrawal, Labour leader Shimon Peres said yesterday.
However, Labour legislators cautioned that sharp disagreements remain over economic issues, including what one party official called the “piggish capitalism” of the Sharon government.
Sharon needs the alliance with Labor to forge ahead with a withdrawal from Gaza and four West Bank settlements by the end of 2005. He lost his majority in Parliament earlier this summer, with coalition hard-liners quitting in protest.
Peres confirmed yesterday that negotiators from Labour and Sharon’s Likud Party have reached agreement on the terms of the Gaza pullback and on general policy toward the Palestinians. Sharon’s aides were not available for comment.
Peres said his main demands were adopted, including introducing a more detailed timetable for a Gaza withdrawal.
Peres also said Sharon was also willing to consider coordination with the Palestinians. “They (Sharon’s negotiators) agreed to see if they can find an effective Palestinian partner,” Peres told the Italian newspaper Il Secolo. Sharon has refused to discuss the pullout with the Palestinians, saying the Palestinian Authority is tainted by terrorism and thus not an acceptable partner. However, Sharon has used Egypt as a go-between.
In the partial agreement, Likud and Labour affirm that they will work toward a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and will try to implement the US-backed “road map.” That peace plan originally envisioned a Palestinian state by 2005, but US officials have since said the deadline is no longer realistic.
The newspaper Yediot Ahronot published what is said was a copy of the Labour-Likud agreement which would accelerate compensation payments for settlers, with payouts to begin as early as next week. Such payments could induce more settlers to leave voluntarily and weaken what is expected to be considerable settler resistance that might delay or even sabotage a withdrawal.
The document also said illegal West Bank settlement outposts would be dismantled immediately, in line with Israel’s obligations under the road map. The Sharon government has only removed a handful of outposts so far, angering the United States. Sharon has cited legal difficulties, though his government has also funneled money to the enclaves for construction, roads and electricity.
Sharon and Peres, members of Israel’s founding generation, were coalition partners in Sharon’s first term. Their pragmatism enabled them to overcome vast political differences; Sharon until recently was a champion of settlement expansion, while Peres oversaw interim peace accords with the Palestinians.
Labor legislators said yesterday that disagreements over economic policy are serious enough to keep Labour out of the government.
Labour opposes Likud’s efforts to privatize state-owned companies and planned cuts in spending on education and welfare. Labor wants Sharon to delay a Cabinet vote on the proposed 2005 budget until the party joins the coalition, a demand the prime minister has refused to meet.
Labour lawmaker Ofir Pines-Paz told Israel Army Radio that “we will not sit in a government in which piggish capitalism is running rampant.”
The Palestinian daily Al-Quds, meanwhile, quoted Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat as saying he would like to hold presidential and parliamentary elections but that Israeli restrictions on Palestinian movement made that impossible.
The newspaper also quoted Arafat as saying that former Gaza security chief Mohammed Dahlan, seen as a potential political challenger, would be free to put forward his candidacy when presidential elections are eventually held.
“But he called me a few days ago, telling me that he supports me,” Arafat said.
In the West Bank, Palestinian police deployed in larger numbers yesterday but remained unarmed as they await Israel’s final permission to carry weapons. Ala Hosni, police chief in the West Bank, said this was the first stage in a plan to restore order. He refused to say what further steps the police would take.
