Israel's ex-PM Ariel Sharon dies

[John ''True Grit'' Wayne]

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-25696601

Former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has died aged 85 after spending eight years in a coma following a stroke.
Mr Sharon was a giant of the Israeli military and political scene, but courted controversy throughout his long career.
The head of the Sheba Medical Centre near Tel Aviv said he had died on Saturday afternoon of heart failure.

Ariel Sharon's life was intimately entwined with the life of the country he loved from the moment of its birth.
He fought in its war of independence in 1948 and from that point until he slipped into a coma in 2006 it seemed there was hardly a moment of national drama in which he did not play a role.
He was always a controversial figure in Israeli politics - certainly not universally loved - but in mourning his passing, Israelis are marking the loss of one of the few public figures left whose career stretched back to the earliest days of their state.

How will he be remembered.

[white-wolf]

God riddance to the butcher of Sabra and Shatila.

[sumskilz]

God riddance to the butcher of Sabra and Shatila.

Elie Hobeika?

[white-wolf]

Elie Hobeika?

His partner at the crime.

[Condottiere 40K]

Probably the only one who could have pulled off a final settlement with the Palestinians.

[justicar5]

Probably the only one who could have pulled off a final settlement with the Palestinians.

This pretty much

[YuriVII]

Probably the only one who could have pulled off a final settlement with the Palestinians.

Don't forget Yitzakh Rabin

[Stavroforos]

A lion of Judah, RIP.

[Menelik_I]

A lion of Judah, RIP.

[Aymer de Valence]

One less.

[Stavroforos]

One less what?

[Atterdag]

Should've passed on from his prison cell in the Hague.

[thelionheart]

As a Lebanese, I respect Sharon as much as I hate him. Unlike most of our leaders he has accomplished something for his people. Albeit at our cost.

[Lord Oda Nobunaga]

He could have made a peace with Palestine, but he didn't and now he is dead. He was a supremely important general in Israel, with him gone and Moshe Dayan Israel has lost. But I do not agree wih Israel and ultimately I think that anyone who shares this sentiment might be relieved that he is gone. While others may mourn his death. Either or he was a rather skilled general.

[nce_wht_guy]

Good, now let's turn him into shark bait.

[John ''True Grit'' Wayne]

What do some like about him and what do others dislike.

[agnes69]

Great man gone, the land down and eternal memory!

[Roma_Victrix]

Today, people in Palestine are celebrating in the streets and making sweets for kids on this occasion, but they're only focusing on Sharon's militant actions as a commander and association with the Likud party earlier in his life. It's like they all collectively ignored the fact that as Israel's Prime Minister he instigated the Israeli withdrawal of the West Bank in 2005 and distanced himself from the war hawk Likud party by joining the Kadima party. At the very least he was one of the few Israeli politicians who sought a peaceful settlement with the Palestinians (continued in limited form by Ehud Olmert). This stands in stark contrast to the current PM of Israel, Netanyahu, who is always firmly opposed to anything the Palestinians bring to the negotiating table. It appears that contrast isn't appreciated much by the Palestinians today.

[athanaric]

Today, people in Palestine are celebrating in the streets and making sweets for kids on this occasion, but they're only focusing on Sharon's militant actions as a commander and association with the Likud party earlier in his life. It's like they all collectively ignored the fact that as Israel's Prime Minister he instigated the Israeli withdrawal of the West Bank in 2005 and distanced himself from the war hawk Likud party by joining the Kadima party. At the very least he was one of the few Israeli politicians who sought a peaceful settlement with the Palestinians (continued in limited form by Ehud Olmert). This stands in stark contrast to the current PM of Israel, Netanyahu, who is always firmly opposed to anything the Palestinians bring to the negotiating table. It appears that contrast isn't appreciated much by the Palestinians today.

Palestinian Arabs aren't really known for introspection. It's more like "blame the Jew for everything".

Just like Milosevic, Hussein or Qaddafi, he was a good leader for his people, but hated by the world for all the brutal things that he did.

Qaddafi was a serial rapist and a terrorist, Hussein was a war criminal and a psychopathic tinpot dictator. Unlike both of these people, Sharon didn't murder or brutalize any of his own countrymen, to my knowledge. You may have a point with Milosevic.

[Heathen Hammer]

Qaddafi was a serial rapist and a terrorist, Hussein was a war criminal and a psychopathic tinpot dictator. Unlike both of these people, Sharon didn't murder or brutalize any of his own countrymen, to my knowledge. You may have a point with Milosevic.

I'm pretty sure that according to some they even ate babies.
Sharon didn't brutalize his own countrymen, but he did that to others.