Press urges Sharon to show leadership

Israel's press is split on the way forward after Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's plan to pull out of the Gaza Strip was rejected by members of his Likud party.

Most commentators believe Mr Sharon can survive by showing leadership and relying on support outside the Likud, but some think he is now politically stranded.

"It is impossible to define the results of yesterday's Likud referendum other than as an earthquake," is the reaction of the biggest-selling daily, Yediot Aharonot.

But an editorial in the paper urges Mr Sharon to continue the fight for his plan to withdraw from Gaza against his own party's opposition.

From this morning on, it is the Likud against the people Sima Kadmon in Yediot Aharonot

"If he wants to keep the disengagement plan alive he needs to confront the majority in his party head-on," it says.

A commentator in the same paper blames Mr Sharon for the plan's rejection, saying he campaigned "too late" and "half-heartedly" for his own initiative.

"Sharon's most stinging defeat is in the realm of leadership," Nahum Barnea writes, while agreeing that Mr Sharon can make amends.

"If he still has the appetite to lead, now is the time."

'Moment of truth'

Writing in the second-largest Hebrew paper, Ma'ariv, Ben Kaspit also calls on Mr Sharon to show leadership.

"What we have here is a people without leadership, a leader without a party, and a party without a people - Sharon's moment of truth has arrived.

"He must smile and soldier on."

In Yediot Aharonot, Sima Kadmon urges Mr Sharon to be bold, and believes he can rely on overwhelming support from outside his own party.

"The majority of the people support his disengagement plan - this majority must be expressed," the article says.

"From this morning on, it is the Likud against the people."

'Lame duck'

A commentator in Ma'ariv, however, thinks Mr Sharon now has nowhere to go, and condemns the low turnout in the Likud vote.

A genuine breach has developed between Ariel Sharon and the Jewish settlers Hannah Kim in Ha'aretz

"By staying away from the ballot box, Likud members are sentencing us to the continuation of a government headed by a lame duck," Dan Margalit writes.

The Sharon government, he adds, has nothing to offer.

"We will have a scared, shrinking government, lacking initiative, constantly preoccupied with its own survival."

A commentator in Ha'aretz says the disengagement plan has lost Sharon the support of one of his main constituencies: the Jewish settlers in the occupied territories.

"For the first time in a long history of interaction, a genuine breach has developed between Ariel Sharon and the Jewish settlers," Hannah Kim says.

"This is a fracture that cannot be mended."

'Slap in the face'

On the Palestinian side, a commentator in Al-Hayat al-Jadidah sees the result as a rebuff for Mr Sharon, saying Likud members rejected his argument that there was no negotiating partner on the Palestinian side.

What is the point of Sharon's trying to dictate a solution when he does not take into consideration the rights of the Palestinian people? Al-Quds

"Likud members did not listen to Sharon's propaganda, while some of them even wanted to give him a slap in the face," Adli Sadiq says.

In the same paper, Ahmad Dahbur says that Sharon's party have embarrassed their "Likud comrade", US President George W Bush.

An editorial in Al-Quds condemns the Israeli government for blaming the plan's defeat on the Palestinian militant attack in Gaza, in which an Israeli settler and her four daughters died.

"The occupation and settlement are responsible for this," the paper says, adding that the plan was flawed in the first place.

"What is the point of Sharon's trying to dictate a solution tailored for Israel's radical right when he does not take into consideration the rights of the Palestinian people?", it asks.

BBC Monitoring, based in Caversham in southern England, selects and translates information from radio, television, press, news agencies and the internet from 150 countries in more than 70 languages.