The New Yorker on Sharon

There's an interesting essay by Ari Shavit of Ha'aretz. Sadly not online. There's nothing earthshattering in it that I can see, but a few points bear brief comment:

Sharon's sons are due a lot of the credit for shifting him centerwards.

Shavit says that Sharon's aides were secretly working on four scenarios, ranging from minimal withdrawal from the West Bank to 92% withdrawal; some in his circle expect a pullback to the security barrier by the end of the decade; but it isn't clear what Sharon himself thought. For that matter, Sharon seems either swayable or very cagey, so it's not possible to predict what he would have done. (A pullback to the fence, then a gradual pullback of the fence over say a decade to a high-90's return of the territories sounds like what one might have hoped for from him, with some international presence in the Jordan valley, and something I would have found reasonable.)

Israel is doing very well of late, economically and otherwise. I knew this from blog discussions, but I haven't seen this fact in the major media, which to be fair I consult much less than before I started reading blogs.