Israeli Cabinet minister resigns over Gaza pullout

JERUSALEM -- Natan Sharansky, an Israeli Cabinet minister with strong ties to the Bush administration, resigned yesterday over Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's plan to withdraw from the Gaza Strip and the northern West Bank this summer and dismantle Jewish settlements.

Sharansky, a former Soviet dissident whose recent book on promoting democracy around the world was cited by President Bush as an inspiration, said Sharon was blundering by not conditioning his ''disengagement plan" on democratic overhauls in the Palestinian Authority. He also said the withdrawal would cause ''a terrible rift in the nation."

The resignation was expected to have almost no impact on Sharon's leadership or his decision-making. The 76-year-old Israeli leader has repeatedly outmaneuvered opponents of the withdrawal plan in his Cabinet and his Likud party, of which Sharansky is a member. Some political analysts even read the move as a recognition of defeat by Sharon's right-wing critics, who failed to scuttle the plan in parliament or force a referendum.

But the decision, carefully expounded in a two-page resignation letter handed to Sharon yesterday, is sure to garner attention in Washington, where Sharansky's political ideas tend to resonate more loudly than they do in his home country.

''In my view, the disengagement plan is a tragic mistake that will exacerbate the conflict with the Palestinians, increase terrorism, and dim the prospects of forging a genuine peace," Sharansky, who spent nine years in a Soviet prison camp before being freed in a 1986 prisoner swap and allowed to immigrate to Israel, wrote in the letter.

At yesterday's Cabinet meeting, Sharon praised Sharansky for his ''outstanding work" as minister of Jerusalem and Diaspora affairs. His resignation goes into effect tomorrow.

Sharansky, 57, said Israel should demand that Palestinian leaders promote freedom of speech in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, independent courts, and a free market. The withdrawal should be linked to ending anti-Israel ''incitement in the Palestinian media" and ''hate-filled indoctrination in Palestinian schools," he wrote in the letter.

Sharansky, a Ukranian-born mathematician who was a member of nearly all the governments that led Israel in the past nine years, has pushed the same political message since he entered politics -- that democracy in the West Bank and Gaza Strip should be a precondition for peace between Israelis and Palestinians. Instead, he said, Israel has often encouraged Palestinian authoritarianism in the hopes that a strong leader would use his power to crush anti-Israel militants.

A book Sharansky published last fall, ''The Case for Democracy," divides the world into democracies and totalitarian regimes -- free and fear countries. He argues that dictators inevitably turn to war to justify their repression and should be forced out by democracies.

Bush told reporters last November that he read the book and gave it to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to read. ''This is a book that summarizes how I feel. I would urge people to read it," he said. Others associated with the first Bush administration, including former Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, and the former chairman of the defense policy board that advises the Pentagon, Richard Perle, have relationships with Sharansky.

But in Israel, Sharansky's ideas have never received much attention. The book has yet to be translated into Hebrew, and many Israelis view Sharansky as an ultra-nationalist whose main agenda is to prevent the handover of land to Palestinians.

''I'm not sure what he wants from the Palestinians," said Hillel Halkin, a columnist for The Jerusalem Post. ''They had a more-or-less fair presidential election last January. They've had free municipal elections and they're preparing for elections in the Palestinian legislature this summer. Isn't that democracy?"

Palestinian rights activists complained frequently that the late Yasser Arafat did not allow enough democracy in the West Bank and Gaza during his decade as leader of the Palestinian Authority. But his successor, Mahmoud Abbas, who was elected by a large majority after Arafat died last November, is seen as a reformer.

Halkin said Sharansky's resignation might be aimed at strengthening his position among hardliners in Likud, who could mount a challenge to Sharon before next year's national election.

Settler leaders praised Sharansky for sticking to his principles at the cost of his seat at the Cabinet table. ''Here is a rational man, a chess master and a man of principle who says quite simply that the plan has been framed wrong and is dangerous to Israel," said Yisrael Medad, a settler activist from Shiloh in the West Bank.

About 9,000 Jewish settlers live in communities slated for dismantling in the Gaza Strip and the northern West Bank. Many of them are expected to resist evacuation. Sharansky said in his resignation letter that Sharon's government was not doing enough to prevent internal strife. He said he no longer felt he could ''faithfully serve" on a Cabinet that was plotting the evacuation of Jews from their homes.

''I really feel very good that today I closed the gap between my opinions and my deeds," he told Israeli Channel Two news.