Prime Minister Ariel Sharon was furious yesterday over the army's plan to announce parts of the "seam" east of the Green Line between the West Bank and Israel a closed military zone. Sharon ordered the army to postpone the announcement and to cancel a press conference planned for it.
According to Sharon, the army should stick to its business and fulfill its missions, and he plans to make sure they do.
He believes there has been improvement in the army since he took office, but one thing has to be made clear: the army executes the decisions made by the political level.
In a meeting of the inner security cabinet called at Ben-Gurion Airport on his return from Moscow yesterday, Sharon ordered the plan brought to the full security cabinet at its meeting next week. The army will make their proposals and the ministers will listen and decide, he said.
On the plane on his way back to Israel, Sharon said bluntly, "there's a government in Jerusalem and the government, and only the government, makes decisions in principle." In off the record comments, he was much more forceful and made clear that Israel does not have an army that has a state, but has a government with a defense establishment and that's the way it will work. He said he plans to make that clear.
Sharon was enraged by the leaks that came from "senior defense sources" and "senior officers" who criticized the political level. At a session with ministers, in the presence of army commanders, Sharon said that everything they leak immediately results in a response from the other side and it's clear who is leaking what to whom. Say it in your own voices and you won't have a problem, the prime minister proposed.
In the case of the closed military zone along the eastern side of the Green Line, Sharon believes the army overstepped its boundaries. He expected after the suicide bombing in Jerusalem on Tuesday that the army would take steps to beef up security around Jerusalem, which it did. But declaring an area a closed military zone is not a technical security step but rather a far-reaching step that involves complex diplomatic and legal issues.
Sharon is under the impression that someone took advantage of his absence to move ahead with the plan. Sources in his office were asking rhetorically whether it was wise to make an announcement that would sound to the world as if Israel were annexing territory in the midst of a campaign to prevent condemnation of Israel at the Durban conference. They also wanted to know why the announcement was to be made on the day Defense Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer was dealing with his race for the Labor Party leadership. And why wasn't acting prime minister and Foreign Minister Shimon Peres involved in the decision.
The defense minister's bureau says everything was done properly and "as far as we're concerned there's no problem."