Abbas' speech, Gilad's tape recordings

Thursday, September 4, 2003

Flowers in a vase painting by Silvia Rosenberg, 70x50 on glued wrapping paper

Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas kept his promise and delivered a speech to the Palestinian Legislative Council on the first 100 days of the PA government he heads, blaming Israel for the collapse of the cease-fire because it acted too hastily after the Jerusalem bus bombing three weeks ago. He praised his government's good ties with the Americans and condemned the American-backed Israeli policy that keeps the 'constitutionally elected' Yasser Arafat under siege in the Muqata.

Abbas hinted at the power struggler underway between him and Arafat, saying there were difficulties yet to be worked out and that he was not satisfied with how the PA is managed. But he did not explicitly call for Arafat to hand over the command of the security services that Abbas has said he needs to deal with armed factions who are in the way of his 'one government, one law, one armed force' policy.

While he delivered his speech inside the PLC hall, outside there was a somewhat stormy demonstration by a few dozen families of Palestinian prisoners who were backed up by a few hundred people, including dozens of masked men from the Fateh-affiliated Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, who marched over to the PLC from Arafat's nearby Muqata.

It was not clear if the demonstrators were uniform in their demands. The families were demanding he arrange more prisoner releases, while the masked men were demanding his resignation calling him a collaborator with Israel and America. The demonstrators did occasionally clash with the police. Israel Radio's reporter may have exaggerated when he said the demonstration was so unruly that the police were getting ready to shoot at the demonstrators. But the reporter was probably not exaggerating when he said Arafat and his new security advisor, Jibril Rajoub, deliberately sent the demonstrators to show Abbas who is boss.

Palestinian politicians interviewed by the Israeli media immediately after Abbas's speech admitted that Ahmed Qureia, the PLC Speaker, had made the arrangements that prevented a vote of confidence that Abbas would probably lose, and called for new elections throughout the Palestinian territories - something that appears in the roadmap after the dismantling of terror groups and the settlement freeze, neither of which are happening. There were reports that after committee meetings on various aspects of the Abbas speech, as early as next week, a vote of confidence could be held.

The speech was overshadowed in the Israeli press, which seems to have become resigned to Abbas' eventually falling from power, by other matters that seemed more pressing. There was the shooting this morning of an Israeli soldier after an arrest near Jenin. Fateh's Al Aqsa brigades were claiming responsibility for it, which helped explain why the Abbas speech was not being taken seriously in the Israeli press today.

More important, however, was the revelation from last night that Gilad Sharon, the premier's son who is refusing to cooperate with the police inquiry into suspicions he was a conduit for bribes to his father when Sharon was foreign minister, secretly tape recorded contractor David Appel during their negotiations for Gilad Sharon's contract. Appel is the Likud powerbroker and construction tycoon, who paid Gilad hundreds of thousands of dollars for 'services rendered.'

The actual services that were rendered are unclear. Gilad Sharon did receive a business degree a couple of years before his deal with Appel, but his business is managing the Sharon family Sycamore Ranch sheep farm, and not marketing a tourism resorts - especially a resort yet to be built and awaiting approval from the Greek government.

According to Haaretz, the contract he signed with Appel explicitly stated that when the first permits were given by the Greeks, Gilad would get $1.5 million. The investigation goes on. According to Channel 10's Immanuel Rosen, the prime minister is planning to sacrifice both his sons, Gilad and MK Omri Sharon, to the prosecution, which is reportedly already preparing indictments, but the prime minister will escape prosecution as the two sons take responsibility for all the affairs now under investigation.

In other developments, the National Insurance Institute director-general resigned to protest budget cuts, while the Housing Ministry issued tenders for the construction of 102 new housing units in the Gush Etzion settlement bloc in West Bank.

Later today, three Israeli pilots in F-15s will take part in an Auschwitz ceremony with the Polish air force, flying over the death camp in what the lead pilot, a lieutenant colonel whose grandparents perished in the Holocaust, called 'the closing of a circle.' There was some debate, particularly after some directors at the Auschwitz museum said they were not pleased with the display of military force at the site, whether the over flight was an appropriate ceremony. But the consensus in the press seemed to be that the intention was not a display of military prowess but an assertion of the survival of the Jewish people.

And a public opinion poll for Israel Radio said the vast majority of Israelis disagree with the Or Commission report on the October 200 riots, a large majority supports a blanket pardon for policemen who might be implicated in an investigation of the riots as the Or commission recommended, and a majority believe the Commission's report should not be an obstacle to Ehud Barak returning to politics.

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