Arik: The Life of Ariel Sharon

by David Landau

  November 1981: now minister of defense, with young settlers at Maon in the Hebron hills (illustration credit ill.41)

  Going over the ground: with Egyptian officers near the canal during an official visit as defense minister (illustration credit ill.42)

  In pain, but in control: Begin with his defense minister, March 1982 (illustration credit ill.43)

  Guard of honor: with South Lebanese army commander Sa’ad Hadad (illustration credit ill.44)

  Allies at war: Begin and Hadad, June 7, 1982 (illustration credit ill.45)

  Costly conquest: Beaufort, June 7, 1982 (illustration credit ill.46)

  King again? With IDF reservists in Lebanon, June 1982. (illustration credit ill.47)

  “Those who say he duped us and misled us are simply distorting.” Cabinet briefing in Lebanon, June 21, 1982. Yitzhak Shamir, foreign minister, in the foreground. Behind him, Mordechai Zippori, general turned minister, a persistent critic of the war. (illustration credit ill.48)

  Rabin (second from right), still supportive: August 1982, near Beirut. Chief of Staff Rafael Eitan is on the left; General Abrasha Tamir is in the center. (illustration credit ill.49)

  With Lebanese presidential candidate Bashir Gemayel at his headquarters near Beirut, August 1982: collusion now, peace later (illustration credit ill.50)

  September 15, 1982, the day before the massacre: Arik and Raful at the IDF command post on a rooftop overlooking Sabra and Shatila (illustration credit ill.51)

  Honor guard for dishonorable departure: February 1983, leaving the Ministry of Defense (illustration credit ill.52)

  Arik’s courtroom victory in New York over Time magazine was not unanimously welcomed back home. (illustration credit ill.53)

  Made his mark on the geography: with unfurled maps in 1984 (illustration credit ill.54)

  “Let me help you build a camp”: with political adviser Yisrael Katz in 1985, starting the hard climb back up the greasy pole (illustration credit ill.55)

  With Lily at a Likud Party meeting, 1986: “by her husband’s side through every one of his battles” (illustration credit ill.56)

  Guest of honor at a Druze feast (illustration credit ill.57)

  The “constrainers”: left to right: Arik, Yitzhak Modai, David Levy. (Behind Arik is Ehud Olmert.) (illustration credit ill.58)

  “Who is in favor of eliminating terror?” Tel Aviv, February 1990, “Night of the Microphones.” (illustration credit ill.59)

  “Who is in favor of eliminating terror?” Tel Aviv, February 1990, “Night of the Microphones.”

  Minister of housing, 1990: a splurge of building—and of settlement (illustration credit ill.61)

  From Russia, with votes (illustration credit ill.62)

  Sycamore Ranch soiree, 1991 (illustration credit ill.63)

  Ousted: election night, 1992 (illustration credit ill.64)

  “Where’s your company commander?” With King Hussein of Jordan, 1997: flowering of a late friendship. (Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is in the background.) (illustration credit ill.65)

  “Tie us up, hand and foot!” With Netanyahu at Wye River Plantation, 1998. (illustration credit ill.66)

  “We don’t eat friends.” With Yonatan, on Sycamore Ranch. (illustration credit ill.67)

  “The hope of peace for us Israelis lies in the principle of separation.” With outgoing prime minister Ehud Barak in the Knesset Speaker’s office, March 7, 2001, moments before Arik is sworn in as prime minister. (illustration credit ill.68)

  On the Temple Mount, September 28, 2000: unintelligent gimmick that changed history (illustration credit ill.69)

  Reuven Adler: saccharine text, slick footage. “No, we weren’t duping the voters.” (illustration credit ill.70)

  Prophetic portrait: election night 2001. With (left to right) Uri Dan, Cyril Kern, Arie Genger. (illustration credit ill.71)

  Grand old coalition (illustration credit ill.72)

  “I can’t even have my own secretary?” With Marit Danon. “He’s not the man you think he is.” (illustration credit ill.73)

  With Mayor Rudolph Giuliani at Ground Zero. “You don’t understand what happened to us,” the U.S. ambassador berated Arik. (illustration credit ill.74)

  Unambiguous evidence: arms haul from the Karine A, January 2002. Left, Chief of Staff Shaul Mofaz; right, Minister of Defense Binyamin Ben-Eliezer. (illustration credit ill.75)

  May 2002: slinking would not be good enough for Shas. “Teaching you where the fish pees from” is a uniquely Israeli idiom meaning humiliation. Arik’s class here comprises Shas members, with their leader Rabbi Yosef visibly sweating. (illustration credit ill.76)

  A bus bombing in Jerusalem, June 2002. Mothers trembled and wept as they sent their children to school. (illustration credit ill.77)

  Reading his thoughts even when he hadn’t yet thought them? Dov Weissglas, attorney, friend, adviser, and finally bureau chief. (illustration credit ill.78)

  “Arik and I, I and Arik.” November 2002: veteran poll reader Netanyahu concedes to the prime minister’s popularity. (illustration credit ill.79)

  With Michal Modai: “Complete poppycock … of course he kissed me.” Behind Arik is Uri Shani. (illustration credit ill.80)

  Comfortable, confident, enjoying the job (illustration credit ill.81)

  Comfortable, too, in the Oval Office (illustration credit ill.82)

  Aqaba, June 2003. Abbas: “It is time to bring all this suffering to an end.” Sharon: “A viable Palestinian state.” (illustration credit ill.83)

  Aqaba: “The president liked Ariel Sharon.” (illustration credit ill.84)

  With Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen), then Palestinian prime minister, July 2003: he constantly and publicly opposed the intifada’s violence. (illustration credit ill.85)

  A more jaundiced view of Sharon’s peace diplomacy: “First, my best wishes for the Eid festival.” (illustration credit ill.86)

  With grandson Rotem, Gilad’s son, at an air force graduation ceremony, June 2002 (illustration credit ill.87)

  Purim at the prime minister’s office: reading the Scroll of Esther with Yitzchak David Grossman, a favorite rabbi (illustration credit ill.88)

  An ignoble act: with Likud Knesset member Naomi Blumenthal, in better days (illustration credit ill.89)

  With Dan Halutz (middle), the new IDF chief of staff, who carried out the disengagement, and (left) Moshe Ya’alon, the old chief of staff, who balked at it (illustration credit ill.90)

  Omri in the Knesset: vicarious political power (illustration credit ill.91)

  With Minister of Justice Tommy Lapid: “Today may be the start of a real peace process with the Palestinians, even though the move we’ve decided on is unilateral.” (illustration credit ill.92)

  Celebrating the Festival of Tabernacles with the Four Species: Was Arik etrogized? (illustration credit ill.93)

  Youngsters at the Gaza Strip settlement of Atzmona, 2001: “What have we got to look for there?” (illustration credit ill.94)

  Crawford, Texas, April 2005: “Mr. Prime Minister, welcome to my home.” (illustration credit ill.95)

  Disengagement, Morag, August 17, 2005: no match for massed phalanxes (illustration credit ill.96)

  Phony war, phony trauma: melodrama at Kfar Darom, August 18, 2005 (illustration credit ill.97)

  Hanukkah, December 2005: between two strokes (illustration credit ill.98)

  “He did not wish to hurt others.” Omri goes to jail, February 2008. (illustration credit ill.99)

  ALSO BY DAVID LANDAU

  Piety & Power: The World of Jewish Fundamentalism

  Ben-Gurion: A Political Life

  Shimon Peres in conversation with David Landau

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