Sharon to offer new pullback proposal

JERUSALEM – Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said Monday he will come up with an alternative withdrawal plan after his proposal to pull out of the Gaza Strip and parts of the West Bank was resoundingly rejected by members of his Likud Party.

Israeli officials suggested that the original plan – which had U.S. backing and was popular with Israelis – would be slightly scaled down and the new version would not be put to a Likud vote.

“I want to say in the clearest fashion there will be another plan,” Sharon told a meeting of Likud lawmakers, according to a participant.

Sharon had proposed his “disengagement plan” as the best way to obtain security for Israel in the absence of peace moves and to defuse international pressure for greater concessions.

Members of Sharon’s traditionally pro-settler party disagreed, voting against the plan 60 percent to 40 percent in a nonbinding referendum Sunday that the Maariv daily labeled a “crushing defeat” for the premier.

Today, an Israeli attack helicopter fired a missile at a group of Palestinians in the Gaza refugee camp of Khan Younis, wounding at least 12, three critically, residents said. Also, Israeli troops took up positions around Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat’s office building in the West Bank city of Ramallah early today, witnesses said.

Government officials scrambled Monday to figure out a way to sidestep the Likud voters and proceed with some form of withdrawal anyway, arguing that with peace efforts frozen and violence with the Palestinians continuing, Israel can’t afford to sit back and do nothing.

Sharon said he would present his new plan to Parliament and to the Cabinet.

“The Likud members said ‘no’ to a specific plan, not to all plans,” Cabinet minister Tzipi Livni said.

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