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CNN Sunday Morning

A Look at Ariel Sharon

Aired June 09, 2002 - 07:56   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: There's a new round of Mid East diplomacy in Washington this week. And Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon is the latest player. He's meeting President Bush on the heels of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, who spent the weekend at Camp David. Afterwards, Mr. Bush declined President Mubarak's suggestion rather to set a deadline for Palestinian statehood.

And CNN's Garrick Utley tells us Prime Minister Sharon's opposition to that has been lifelong.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

GARRICK UTLEY, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): There he was, a child born in 1928, growing up on a farm, a young boy with his dog, a family with a dream, to learn the land of Palestine into a Jewish homeland. And what would become of the boy? Meet Ariel Sharon.

ARIEL SHARON, PRIME MINISTER, ISRAEL: We shall continue to fight terror. We shall continue to fight the terrorists with all our strength.

UTLEY: The foreign boy became a warrior. He fought in the war following the creation of the state of Israel in 1948. From the beginning, Sharon the soldier believed in brute force to preserve Israel's security.

In 1954, he led a retaliatory raid against terrorists. There in the Arab village of Kibiya (ph), he blew up 45 homes. Sharon said later he didn't know there were people inside. There were; 69 of them died. There were more wars to come. In 1967, Sharon commanded an armored brigade. Six years later in the Sinai, he pushed the Egyptian army back across the Suez Canal.

(on camera): Despite his courage and victories, and because of his obsession with defeating Israel's enemies, there have been questions about Ariel Sharon. His critics in Israel say that all too often, his strategy is simply to attack first, and then figure out the consequences later.

(voice-over): Which is what happened in 1982, when Sharon, the minister of defense, sent Israel's army into Lebanon to stop terrorist attacks. He laid siege to Beirut, which was Yasser Arafat's headquarters. Sharon would say later he regretted, he did not kill Arafat then and there. And there would be other consequences. In two Palestinian refugee camps named Sabre and Chatillah (ph), Sharon allowed Lebanese Christian militia groups into the camps. Seven hundred or more Palestinians were massacred.

An Israeli investigation found that Sharon was negligent in not stopping the killing, and he was compelled to resign as minister of defense. But for Ariel Sharon, there was another battlefield to fight on, politics. In government, he has pushed for the building of Jewish settlements on the occupied West Bank. Since becoming prime minister, dozens of new settlements have been started. Sharon sees them as new facts that cannot be changed.

Certainly not changed by concessions and compromise, Sharon rejects the peace process pursued by previous Israeli leaders. Some critics say he helped to sabotage it. As when he walked on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, holy ground for Muslims, a deliberate provocation in the eyes of Palestinians that reignited the rage of their intifadah, which led to the suicide bombings and Israeli retaliation.

So what does Ariel Sharon do now? President Bush has called Sharon a man of peace, but can the lifelong warrior bring peace to his people?

Garrick Utley, CNN.

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