Sharon faces votes of no confidence

Israel’s parliament today opens what is expected to be a stormy winter session with a warning from the speaker that passions over Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s planned Gaza pullout next year could boil over into fistfights, and the government itself could fall.

Yesterday, Israel pressed ahead with its offensive in northern Gaza with air strikes that killed two Palestinian militants.

The Gaza withdrawal was expected to be the cornerstone of Sharon’s speech to parliament today, in the traditional address by the prime minister to open the session.

While Sharon would have a parliamentary majority in favour of the pullout with the help of the moderate Labour opposition, his minority government could fall over a domestic issue like the state budget.

Labour has said it will support Sharon’s Gaza disengagement plans for now, but will not wait patiently for implementation.

“There is no longer an automatic safety net,” said Labour legislator Dalia Itzik, and Labour planned to oppose Sharon on domestic matters.

The 120-seat parliament votes on two motions of no confidence today, and though Sharon’s coalition commands only 59 votes at best, Itzik said she did not expect the required 61 votes to oust the government now.

Parliament Speaker Reuven Rivlin, a stalwart of Sharon’s Likud Party, doubts that the government can complete its term, due to expire in November 2006.

“I don’t see this government running the distance,” he said yesterday.

Opposition to the Gaza pullout is strong among Sharon’s traditional supporters. Sharon did an ideological about-face with his plan to rid Gaza of all its 21 Jewish settlements, along with removing four from the West Bank.

Sharon was the main force behind building and expanding settlements, and many of his Likud followers still favour that line. The party has voted against the pullout twice in different frameworks.

The deep disagreements are expected to spill over onto the parliament floor, beyond usual bouts of heckling and name-calling.

“The dispute could, God forbid, come to fistfights between members, each one with deep feelings of absolute justification,” he said.

Meanwhile, in the northern Gaza Strip yesterday, Israeli troops kept up a large-scale operation meant to stop Palestinians from firing rockets at nearby Israeli towns and settlements.

An Israeli aircraft fired a missile at a group of gunmen in the Jebaliya refugee camp in northern Gaza after nightfall, killing a man Palestinians said was one of a group of gunmen organising to attack Israeli forces, and wounding seven others.

The army said the men were preparing to set off a bomb.

Earlier yesterday, Israeli aircraft fired a missile at a home near a Hamas stronghold in the Jebaliya refugee camp. The strike killed a 38-year-old Palestinian civilian and seriously wounded eight other Palestinians, including a girl, hospital officials said.

It was not clear why the army targeted the house – not far from the Kholfa Mosque, a Hamas power base. The army did not comment.

The offensive began on September 29 and was expanded after militants launched a home-made rocket into the Israeli town of Sderot, killing two children, later that day.

The raid was intended to stop militants from launching the rockets into Israel, though militants have continued to fire them off during the operation.

Also yesterday, a Palestinian gunman wounded earlier in the army’s offensive in northern Gaza died in the hospital, officials said.

Today, two Palestinian gunmen wounded in separate airstrikes over the weekend died of their injuries, hospital officials said.

The deaths brought the number of Palestinians killed in the operation to 99. Almost half of those killed were non-combatants. Eighteen of the dead were 16 or younger, Palestinian officials said.

Early today, armoured vehicles and bulldozers rumbled into the town of Deir el-Balah in central Gaza. Gunfights erupted between troops and Palestinian gunmen. At least one Palestinian was wounded, witnesses reported.

In another development, Army Radio reported yesterday that a reserve army officer was arrested on suspicion of selling forged permits to Palestinians seeking entry into Israel. The report did not name the officer, a lieutenant colonel, but said he would be brought to court for a hearing today.

The army said as the man was a reservist, the matter was in the hands of the civilian police and court system.

Israel tightly controls entry of Palestinians into Israel with roadblocks, checkpoints and a system of work permits. The Israelis say the reason is to stop Palestinian attackers from entering.