ISRAEL

Uri Avnery: The Best Show in Town
The most talented director could not have done better. It was a perfect show.

Television viewers all over the world saw heroic Israeli soldiers on their screens battling the fanatical settlers. Close-ups: faces twisted with passion, a soldier lying on a stretcher, a young woman crying in despair, children weeping, youngsters storming forward in fury, masses of people wrestling with each other. A battle of life and death.

There is no room for doubt: Ariel Sharon is leading a heroic fight against the settlers in order to fulfil his promise to remove "unauthorized" outposts, even "inhabited" ones. The old warrior is again facing a determined enemy without flinching.

The conclusion is self-evident, both in Israel and throughout the world: if such a tumultuous battle takes place for a tiny outpost inhabited by hardly a dozen people, how can one expect Sharon to remove 90 outposts, as promised in the Road Map? If things look like that when he has to remove a handful of tents and one small stone building - how can one even dream of evacuating real settlements, where dozens, hundreds or even thousands of families are living?

This must have impressed George Bush and his people. Unfortunately, it has not impressed me.

It makes me laugh.