jerusalem | Forever the rebel with a cause, Soviet refusenik-turned-democracy proponent Natan Sharansky has left the Israeli government rather than take part in the withdrawal from the Gaza Strip.
Sharansky tendered his resignation as Diaspora Affairs minister Monday, May 2, accusing the Sharon government of failing to demand Palestinian reform as a prerequisite to peace moves.
“As you know, I have opposed the disengagement plan from the beginning, on the grounds that I believe any concessions in the peace process must be linked to democratic reforms within Palestinian society,” Sharansky wrote in an open letter to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.
“I no longer feel that I can faithfully serve in a government whose central policy — indeed, sole raison d’etre — has become one to which I am so adamantly opposed.”
Sharon, who lost two right-wing coalition partners and a Cabinet member from his own Likud Party last year over the plan to withdraw from Gaza and the northern West Bank this summer, took Sharansky’s walkout in stride. He voiced regret at the decision and thanked Sharansky for “combating anti-Semitism the world over.”
It was not immediately clear who would inherit the diaspora affairs portfolio.
In any event, Sharansky pledged in his letter, “I will continue my lifelong efforts to contribute to the unity and strength of the Jewish people both in Israel and in the diaspora.”
By quitting the Cabinet, Sharansky effectively finds himself outside of Israeli politics, because he does not hold a Knesset seat. But his shift to private citizen seemed to many to be a natural move for the author of the recent best-seller “The Case for Democracy,” which President Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice publicly praised.
The Jerusalem Post speculated that Sharansky would focus on promoting his book.
Sharansky was absent from this week’s Cabinet meeting, where former colleagues commended his resignation as an act of integrity.
But Meir Sheetrit of Likud took issue with Sharansky’s reasoning.
“The prime minister has always insisted that until there is democracy in the Palestinian Authority, there will be no peace talks. The disengagement from Gaza is a unilateral, intermediate step done for Israel’s good,” he said.
Concern for the Jewish state’s internal harmony was another motivation cited in Sharansky’s letter. “We are heading toward a terrible rift in the nation, and to my great chagrin I feel that the government is making no serious effort to prevent it,’ he wrote.