SPAIN REDUX:

Sharon's party rejects pullout plan: Militant attack influences vote (Dan Ephron, May 3, 2004, Boston Globe)

Members of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's Likud party firmly rejected his plan to withdraw from the Gaza Strip and four settlements in the West Bank in a referendum yesterday, plunging Israeli politics into disarray and casting a pall over the leadership of Sharon, whose "disengagement plan" from the Palestinians had become a cornerstone of his premiership.

The vote was influenced in part by a Palestinian shooting attack in Gaza in the early afternoon that killed an Israeli mother and her four daughters.

In a statement issued by his office hours after the voting among Likud's 193,000 members ended, Sharon conceded defeat but said he would not resign. Analysts said the embarrassing results might force Sharon to reshuffle his Cabinet or even move for early elections.

Early today, with all the votes counted, opponents of the plan had 60 percent and supporters only 39 percent, Army Radio reported.

Going into yesterday's ballot, surveys predicted a much closer contest. But the Palestinian attack, which occurred near a bloc of settlements slated for evacuation under Sharon's plan, tilted the vote in favor of the hard-liners.

Hard to believe the plan would ever have won if the numbers are quite this lopsided, but if so this is no different than the Spaniards allowing their internal politics to be dictated by terrorists. Mr. Sharon should just ignore the vote and bring the plan to the floor of the Knesset anyway. Party votes are just a courtesy, not an element of governance.

Posted by Orrin Judd at May 3, 2004 8:17 AM