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Bush Hopes For Sharon Victory In Israeli Election

26-Jan-2003 2:20AM

Story from AFP / Christophe de Roquefeuil Copyright 2003 by Agence France-Presse (via ClariNet)

WASHINGTON, Jan 25 (AFP) - The US administration is looking kindly on the prospect of Ariel Sharon being reelected prime minister of Israel next week as it seeks a reliable partner in any war against Iraq.

It has even helped Sharon's cause a little by holding back a new international effort to strike a peace bargain between Israel and the Palestinians until after Tuesday's election.

President George W. Bush and the conservative Israeli leader share a common fear of terrorism and an aversion for Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat. Sharon, who seems headed towards another term in office, also has strong support among top Bush advisers, as well as the US public.

The election explains why the United States held up the "roadmap" for Middle East peace it has been working out with other members of a diplomatic Quartet: the European Union, Russia and the United Nations.

In December, Sharon persuaded Washington to delay the drafting of a final version of the peace blueprint until after the election, despite EU demands that a final draft be agreed as quickly as possible.

The plan, based on a US initiative, foresees various stages to a Palestinian state being created by 2005.

Sharon virtually dismissed the Quartet initiative in a recent interview with US magazine Newsweek. "Oh, the Quartet is nothing!" he said. "Don't take it seriously! There is (another) plan that will work."

But US Secretary of State Colin Powell has called for the plan to be pushed with a new energy as soon as the election is out of the way.

Sharon has also also insisted that Arafat should be removed from any position of influence and a new leader put in charge of the Palestinian Authority.

Scott Lasensky, a Middle East specialist at the New York-based Council on Foreign Relations, said that despite some annoyance at Sharon's tactics, the temporary block on the Middle East peace bid showed implicit US support for the former Israeli army general's election campaign.

He added that because of the moves toward an armed showdown with Iraq "the Bush administration has no appetite to seek to renewed Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations."

This strategy also highlights the strong contacts that Sharon has built up within the conservative and strongly Christian US administration.

If relations with Powell are sometimes tense, Sharon has important friends in Washington.

"There is a shared perspective, there is a lot of mutual interest, there is a great deal of political affinity betweeen domestic political forces on both sides," commented Lasensky.

Sharon has met Bush at least seven times over the past two years. He can also count on Vice President Dick Cheney, Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and his deputy secretary Paul Wolfowitz, and the new White House advisor on Middle East affairs, Elliott Abrams, as allies.

"President Bush is viewing all regional conflicts through the prism of the war against terrorism. This vision tends to overlap with Sharon's vision of Israel's battle with the Palestinians and what he sees as its own war on terrorism," said the Middle East expert.

The United States wants to be able to count on help from Israel to head off any increased anti-American sentiment in the Arab world that follows any military action against Iraq.

Israel in turn wants increased US security help in case of any repercussions it faces from any war. The two countries have already stepped up their cooperation.

Several US officials believe that a regime change in Iraq would end a serious source of tension in the Middle East, therefore boosting hopes of acheiving peace between Israel and the Palestinians.

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