Clearly, Sharon is holding back. Clearly, he will not hold back forever. Clearly, when he strikes that will be the end of Arafat and every member of the Palestinian police and every member of the Palestinian terrorist groups. Although the Palestinians have improved their fighting ability recently, there are utterly overmatched by Israel when Israel takes the gloves off. The Palestinians (and Muslim militants in general) are DELUSIONAL, which ultimately leads to defeat in any war.
There are several possible reasons that Sharon may be holding back, but given Bush's commitment to the war on terror and the insane determination of the Palestinians to cast their lot with Al-Qaeda, and given the lack of recent public friction between Sharon and Bush or between Sharon and his domestic opposition, it is clear that Bush WILL give Sharon the go-ahead at some point and it will all be over in a few days.
What is causing the delay is probably the preparation of a plan to deal with the other Arab countries. They need to be persuaded that it would be suicidal to attack Israel; the rulers of Syria, Egypt, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia can probably be persuaded to sit on their hands while Israel annihilates the Palestinian fighting capability.
That leaves three wild cards: Iran, Iraq, and WMDs. Iran and Iraq will be handled by making it clear to the armies of those countries that when the shooting starts that they will have the choice between obeying their demented leaders and dying, or deposing them.
As for WMDs, if the Arabs have them they will eventually use them, we can not afford to be deterred by WMDs. We and Israel will get our civil defense at the highest level of readiness, then Sharon will unleash the army against the Palestinians, and if they launch their WMDs they will not win, and it will still be better than giving them time to prepare more and deadlier WMDs.
Do you honestly think Dubya is going to green light Sharon and deal with the other Muslim elements that might come into play? Because that would be a real reversal of our Mid East policy.. Frankly, I don't know if he's got the courage to do it.