Peres says he's backing Sharon in election

Veteran Israeli statesman Shimon Peres addresses the media during a news conference in his office in Tel Aviv. Picture / Reuters

TEL AVIV - Veteran Israeli statesman Shimon Peres announced he was throwing his support behind Prime Minister Ariel Sharon in an election in March, and ending his own political activity in the Labour Party.

Peres's move, widely expected after his surprise defeat in a Labour leadership ballot three weeks ago, was a vote of confidence by the Nobel peace laureate in Sharon's pledge to make "painful concessions" for peace with the Palestinians.

"I ask myself, 'What is the main issue facing Israel in coming years?'" Peres told a news conference. "I have no doubt this is the inevitable intersection of peace and diplomatic progress."
Peres, 82, said Sharon was the most suitable person for the job of peacemaking, adding: "I have therefore decided to support his candidacy and co-operate with him in achieving these objectives."

Israeli media reports said Sharon would offer Peres the job of peace envoy if the prime minister's new Kadima party won the election, on March 28.

"My activities in the (Labour) party have come to an end," Peres said, stopping short of formally announcing his resignation from the party.

He did not say if he would be joining Kadima.

As Labour leader and Israel's vice premier, Peres helped Sharon complete a pullout of troops and Jewish settlers in Gaza last September, despite protests in Sharon's former party, Likud, that this was rewarding Palestinian violence.

Peres's Labour colleagues deplored his walkout.

"I feel sorry for Peres who, having done so much for the country, will be remembered for abandoning his home," senior Labour member Ofir Pines-Paz told the YNET news website.

Sharon's decision to quit Likud last week was a gamble that could redefine Israeli politics. He said he could not push for peace with the Palestinians while "wasting time" battling far-right rivals in the movement he co-founded in 1973.

But he has also insisted that talks on Palestinian statehood under a US-backed peace "road map" cannot resume until Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas disarms the militants spearheading a 5-year-old uprising.

Twice prime minister, but never elected to the position, Peres was visibly stunned when trade union chief Amir Peretz, a Moroccan-born Jew, scored an upset victory in the race for a Labour leadership long dominated by Jews of European descent.

Palestinian chief negotiator Saeb Erekat said the election was an internal Israeli affair but added:

"I hope that once the elections are over, the Israelis will have chosen a government that is willing to re-engage in a meaningful peace process that will end the occupation and the conflict."

A Palestinian parliamentary election is scheduled for January 25, the first time that the militant group Hamas will participate in a legislative ballot.

Abbas declared a truce jointly with Sharon last February as a prelude to the Gaza pullout. But he has resisted Israeli calls to disarm militants, saying this would lead to civil war and that he prefers to co-opt them into the Palestinian security services and the political mainstream.

- REUTERS