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Israel Faces Government Crisis over Cost of Military Offensives
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| Sharon
saw his majority in the 120-seat Knesset dwindle to 65 seats.
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OCCUPIED
JERUSALEM, May 21 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - Israeli Prime
Minister Ariel Sharon faced his most serious government crisis yet
after dismissing four ministers from the country's third-largest party
who voted Monday, May 20, against an emergency economic plan.
The
austerity package, aimed at meeting the cost of the occupation army's
offensive against the Palestinians, a plan to transform the West Bank
and Gaza Strip into cantons surrounded by buffer zones and to
intensify colonial settlement-building, was rejected in parliament by
the influential ultra-Orthodox Shas party.
Sharon
saw his majority in the 120-seat Knesset dwindle to 65 seats after
dismissing the four Shas ministers who voted against the plan, while
five vice-ministers were also sacked and the party's fifth minister
resigned following the announcement, Agence France-Presse (AFP)
reported.
Shas's
support was crucial to Sharon's landslide election victory in February
2001 and its entry in the broad national unity government was bitterly
negotiated.
"I
am not concerned by the political repercussions of this vote and I
would rather be on the side of the poor than on that of the
government," Shas leader and interior minister Eli Yishai was
quoted as saying Monday night.
According
to Israeli public radio, he nevertheless said: "It is still
possible to talk and there is nothing irreparable."
Yossi
Sarid, who heads the left-wing opposition Meretz party, had said
immediately after the vote it announced the end of Sharon's very broad
coalition.
The
plan, which aimed to slash the budget deficit by some 13 billion
shekels (2.6 billion dollars) by cutting spending and raising taxes,
was rejected by 47 votes to 44 and one abstention. Sharon intends to
submit it to parliament again Wednesday, May 22.
Under
the plan, value added sales tax would go up by one percent, while
family allowances are to be cut by 200 million dollars.
The
price of fuel and cigarettes has already been hiked, while investment
income is also to be taxed.
The
cut in family allowances was also originally intended to affect only
those households which have no one serving in the Israeli army,
notably the Israeli Arabs and the Orthodox Jews, said AFP.
The
cut was said to reach 200 million dollars, a figure which corresponds
exactly to the estimated cost of building a highly controversial fence
around the reoccupied West Bank and Gaza Strip.
Sharon's
government announced Monday it would press on with its fence project.
Israeli
Defense Minister Binyamin Ben Eliezer met with Israeli mayors Monday,
and "confirmed he intends to proceed with a continuous security
barrier, notably including a fence and electric equipment, along the
350 kilometer (215 mile) demarcation line," the defense ministry
said in a statement carried by AFP.
"Initial
work will start on a section of between 70 and 80 kilometers and a
budget has been released for this purpose," it said, without
specifying where work would begin.
Construction
of the barrier has yet to start, but the deadline for its completion
has been moved up to within the next six months, one of the mayors at
the meeting was quoted as telling public radio after the meeting.
The
idea has been criticized by the left, which said it would not work and
called for political negotiations to tackle the 20-month-old crisis
since the start of the second Palestinian Intifada against Israeli
occupation. It was also rejected by hardline Jewish settlers fearful
they will be abandoned on the wrong side of the fence, said AFP.
The
idea of fence that would turn the Palestinian Territories into cantons
has already sparked outrage from the Palestinians, who on Monday
slammed Israel's "apartheid" in the West Bank.
A
senior aide to Yasser Arafat said the Palestinian President had called
on the world community to "put an end to this new chapter of
apartheid which aims to transform the West Bank and the Gaza Strip
into cantons surrounded by buffer zones and to intensify
settlement-building."
Israel's
economic performance has plummeted since the Palestinian Intifada
erupted in September 2000, as inflation threatens to reach 8 percent
by the end of 2002 and the Gross Domestic Product receded by 0.5
percent in 2001, recording its worst score since 1953.
The
Israeli shekel fell by some 0.9 percent against the dollar at opening
Tuesday, May 21, and shares on the Tel Aviv stock exchange were down
by 0.5 percent on average.
Israeli
Finance Minister Sylvan Shalom stuck Tuesday by his emergency
austerity plan despite the crisis into which its rejection on first
reading plunged the coalition of Sharon.
"Parliament
should vote again on the plan, in principle on Wednesday. It is
important for this plan to be approved because insecurity and a
pre-election mood hurt stock markets already hit by 20 months of
war," Shalom said on public radio. 
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