Premier Menachem Begin expressed what Israeli newspapers today said was unusual criticism of Defense Minister Ariel Sharon at yesterday’s Cabinet meeting. But the Premier’s remarks, the papers noted, were muted and indirect. The Prime Minister’s office today denied that his criticism was, indeed, directed at Sharon. But commentators continued to insist that Sharon was the target for Begin’s barbs.
According to press reports, Begin criticized “certain Christian circles in Lebanon who had dismissed the Philip Habib negotiations as fraud and deception,” adding that they “had no right to describe the plan for the PLO exodus from west Beirut in that manner.”
The papers pointed out that there had been little, if any, reports of such remarks by Lebanese Christian leaders. But Israeli officials known for their close links with Sharon, who frequently give background briefings in his name, have in recent days quoted “most authoritative sources” as using those terms of criticism for Habib’s activities.
SHARON: THERE IS NO AGREEMENT ON PLO DEPARTURE
Sharon’s critics claim that the Defense Minister is, in any event, opposed to a peaceful PLO departure from west Beirut under the terms of President Reagan’s special envoy, preferring to attack the PLO forces and forcing them out by a military defeat.
The latest indication of this attitude was in an interview with an Israel Television correspondent in Beirut after his lengthy meeting with Habib yesterday. Sharon stressed that “no agreement” had been reached by Habib with anybody on a planned withdrawal of PLO forces, mainly because no Arab country had agreed to accept them, apart from a small number who might be taken by Jordan, Egypt or the Sudan.
“They have nowhere to go at this moment,” Sharon said in the interview, “Because there is no Arab country willing to accept them, there is no arrangement at this moment, no agreement, or any possible deal.” He added that “the PLO is on the verge of removal, one way or another.”
Sharon’s statement came even as Begin said in Jerusalem that he had accepted a proposal by Habib that an international force move into west Beirut, as part of a plan to get the PLO forces out of the city and then out of Lebanon al together after most but not necessarily all of the terrorists withdraw.
Although Sharon’s popularity among Israelis has increased since the war in Lebanon began June 6, his popularity in the Cabinet has been diminishing. Some Cabinet ministers feel that the Cabinet is not in control of the situation, that Sharon, and not the Cabinet as a whole, is making arbitrary decisions regarding the tactics and strategy of the war.
The issue was raised obliquely at last Sunday’s Cabinet meeting when ministers pressed Sharon with detailed questions about the advance of the Israel Defense Force earlier that day to capture the Beirut international airport. The ministers were apparently unaware at the time of their meeting of the massive extent of the IDF’s bombing and shelling of west Beirut that day.
Sharon contended that the IDF’s advance was a “local tactical action” in response to the terrorists breaking the cease-fire. He apparently argued that the advance was covered by the long-standing decision-in-principle that Israel will not agree to a one-sided cease-fire and that Israel’s response to PLO violations would not necessarily be directly related in scope or in area to the precise violations.
RESERVISTS CALL FOR SHARON’S REMOVAL
Meanwhile, a group of reservists recently released after fighting in Lebanon told a press conference in Jerusalem today that they had yesterday delivered to Begin a document signed by more than 2,000 front line reservists asking that Sharon be removed from his post because servicemen no longer had confidence in him.
In another development dealing with the PLO departure from west Beirut, Foreign Minister Yitzhak Shamir told the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Security Committee today that there were some indications that the PLO was prepared to leave, but the problem remained of where they would go. A fierce debate is reported to have taken place between Shamir and opposition Labor Party members of the committee about the correct policy to be instituted in the Beirut area.
Former Premier Yitzhak Rabin said that since no Arab countries would accept the beleaguered PLO forces, his proposals for their temporary stay in the Tripoli area in northern Lebanon should be seriously considered, instead of being rejected out of hand by the government.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
