Michael Sukkar (Deakin, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On indulgence,. I rise to speak in relation to the condolence motion on the death of Mr Ariel Sharon. We heard yesterday from the Minister for Foreign Affairs, who had the honour of representing the Australian government at a memorial service for Mr Sharon at the Knesset on 13 January and at his burial service at the Sharon family farm in Negev. The foreign minister reflected on Mr Sharon's deep commitment to safeguarding Israel's security and prosperity. This lifelong dedication to the state of Israel deserves recognition and will forever be remembered, not only by the people of Israel but also by the people of Australia who counted Mr Sharon as a friend.

Mr Sharon fought for the survival of the state of Israel as a soldier in Israel's major wars, including the Arab-Israeli war of 1948, as a brigadier general in the 1967 Six-Day War, and as a commander in the 1973 Yom Kippur War. He distinguished himself on the battlefield, gaining recognition as one of the country's most skilled and courageous commanders, before turning to politics to continue his service to the Israeli people.

Mr Sharon was as courageous off the field as he had been on it, as he rose through the ranks to become the prime minister. A strong-willed figure, he made a significant mark on the global political landscape. At times he attracted controversy, but inevitably he commanded respect from friends and foes alike for his determination and commitment to the state of Israel. I salute this commitment.

Towards the end of his service as prime minister, Mr Sharon's determination to secure Israel's future saw him bravely shift towards a two-state solution, recognising this as the only pathway to realising that outcome. The work to realise this vision endures today as countries, including Australia, support Israel's right to live in peace within internationally recognised borders and the resumption of final status negotiations between Israel and Palestine. Australia values its longstanding relationship with Israel, which is based on shared values, common interests and strong political, economic, cultural and social ties. This is a relationship that was fostered during Mr Sharon's prime ministership and that continues to flourish under the Australian government today.

We recognise that the loss of Mr Sharon is deeply felt by the Israeli people, and we extend our sympathies to his family and to the nation as they mourn his passing.

Josh Frydenberg (Kooyong, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On indulgence, I would like to endorse the very fine words of my friend and colleague the member for Deakin on this condolence motion for Ariel Sharon. As was mentioned, he was a great Israeli soldier, politician, and prime minister for the years between 2001 and 2006, who died of a stroke at the beginning of this year, in 2014.

Ariel Sharon was the son of Russian migrants. He grew up on a farm; he joined the Haganah, which was the pre-state Zionist fighting brigade; he was a member of the elite fighting forces; and he played key roles in some of Israel's defining battles, namely the war of independence in 1948, the 1956 Sinai campaign, the 1967 Six-Day War, the Yom Kippur War in 1973 and also the 1982 Lebanon war. He held a number of portfolios before rising to be Prime Minister, including Minister of Energy and Water Resources, Minister of Housing and Construction, Minister of Industry and Trade, Minister of Defense, of course, and Minister of Foreign Affairs.

He was, in the words of President Shimon Peres, a man upon whose shoulder Israel's security rested. At his funeral, which was attended by dignitaries from across the world, including former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, our own Minister for Foreign Affairs, Julie Bishop, and Vice President of the United States, Joe Biden. Vice President Biden said:

… like all historic leaders, all real leaders, he had a north star that guided him … His north star was the survival of the state of Israel and the Jewish people wherever they resided.

Australia is an enduring and important friend of the state of Israel. It is so because the relationship is based on shared values—the values of democracy—and also the commitment to seeing Israel have its own security within internationally recognised borders. Currently, Israel is suffering at the hands of a pincer movement at both its north and its south. On its north, groups like Hezbollah, supported by the Iranian government, are involved in the Syrian conflict, which has seen a tragic loss of civilian life and creates great instability on Israel's northern border; in the south, we have seen the troubles in Egypt after the fall of the Morsi regime and the Muslim Brotherhood—a group that is not a friend of Israel—as well as the work of Hamas and others that seek to put an obstacle in the path of peace.

This delicate security position that Israel finds itself in is compounded by an international movement to undermine Israel's legitimacy in the minds of fair-thinking people across the world, namely the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement, which seeks to undermine relationships with Israeli researchers, academics, artists and civilians, merely because they are from the state of Israel. Australia will not tolerate a world in which that sort of behaviour goes on and will always be there to support Israel as it faces difficult security challenges. I am sure Ariel Sharon, if he were alive today, would acknowledge the courageous leadership and support that both the Prime Minister, Tony Abbott, and the foreign affairs minister, Julie Bishop, extend to Israel. Also, he would have been pleased to see the kind words that have been extended to him by world leaders, at the time of his passing, acknowledging his deep commitment to the state of Israel, to the security and prosperity of its people and, by extension, to the betterment of the broader community in the Middle East.

Andrew Southcott (Boothby, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I would like to make a few brief remarks on the passing of Ariel Sharon. Certainly, Ariel Sharon has been at the centre of key events in the life of Israel. He is one of the most influential figures in Israel's history, both as a military commander and as a political leader.

He was born in Palestine in 1928 into a family of intellectuals. The need to fight for the new country of Israel determined his career. He joined a Zionist militia at the age of 14; eventually he commanded a special forces unit and was well known for his military career. He fought during each of Israel's five wars. For many Israelis, he was the hero of the Yom Kippur War of 1973—the man who led his troops across the Suez Canal and thus saved Israel from defeat by Egypt. He was called a warhorse. He was known as the bulldozer, a larger-than-life, blustering figure who came to dominate the domestic political scene as much by his sheer physical presence as by his rhetoric. He very much supported the Jewish settler movement. After his military career, he moved into politics. He served as a defence adviser to Yitzhak Rabin before being appointed minister of agriculture by Rabin's successor, Prime Minister Begin, in 1977. He was elected to Israel's parliament, the Knesset, as a Likud member in December 1973. While he was someone who fought in all of Israel's five wars, he was very concerned about having peace and security for Israel.

I was fortunate enough to witness a meeting between Ariel Sharon and Prime Minister John Howard in September 2005, shortly before he had his stroke. One of the things I remember from that meeting is that Ariel Sharon spoke very warmly about Australia and about his boyhood memories of the Australian horses that he remembered. These were horses that were left behind in Palestine by the Australian Light Horse from the First World War. As members will remember, quarantine regulations meant that the horses were not able to return to Australia. Many of the light-horsemen had very painful separations from their horses. He remembered these horses, which were known as walers, and spoke of how his first memories of Australia were actually through our horses left in Palestine from the First World War. It was, as I remember, a very warm meeting between Prime Minister Sharon and Prime Minister Howard. Prime Minister Howard spoke about his times, also as a young man, travelling throughout the Middle East and of his stay in Jerusalem, made when he was a young man on his way to London.

Ariel Sharon has been a key figure in Israel's history and has been very important for that state, for the survival of that state, for the security of that state and, ultimately, for a peaceful future for that state.

Paul Fletcher (Bradfield, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Communications) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

If you visit Israel—as I have been fortunate enough to do on three occasions, most recently in 2012—you cannot but be struck by the small size of the country, by the challenge involved in defending that tiny land and by the extraordinary history of the modern nation of Israel, founded shortly after World War II. When you visit Yad Vashem, the Holocaust memorial, you gain some tiny measure of understanding of the urgency with which the founding generation of Israelis fought to establish the modern state of Israel. When you learn of the feats of the ragtag band of citizen fighters, some of them exhausted survivors of the horrors of the Holocaust in Europe, in defending their new nation in the face of active hostility from many nations around them in the war of independence and in the face of what might be called studied indifference from many in the West, who might have been expected to come to their assistance, you cannot but be astounded.

Ariel Sharon was one of the founding generation of the modern state of Israel. We know him now, of course, on the basis of his extraordinary career and achievements and presence throughout Israeli politics over many, many years. We know him as an Israeli general of the first rank, a former commander in the Israeli army, a former Israeli Minister of Defense and somebody with a very distinguished political career who was Prime Minister of Israel on several occasions. Of course, he was a man who did a number of unexpected and surprising things in his career. In 2004 and 2005 he orchestrated Israel's unilateral disengagement from the Gaza Strip. Facing stiff opposition to this policy within his own party, the Likud, in November 2005 he left Likud to form a new party, Kadima.

The title that Ariel Sharon choose for his biography, Warrior, perhaps captures one of the most well-known facets of this complex man, but his appreciation of the strategic challenges and the moral obligations facing the modern Israel was more complex and nuanced. I will quote the remarks of former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, who had this to say:

He had the toughness of mind to despise all illusions about the threats facing Israel.

But he had the imagination to know that genuine peace, if attainable with honour and dignity both for Arabs and Israelis, is the anchor ultimately for Israel's security.

The success and the presence of the modern state of Israel, achieved in the face of repeated military attacks and almost never-ending terrorist threats over a period of nearly 70 years, is quite an extraordinary achievement. Israel today is a vigorous, successful, multiparty democracy. Amongst other things, it is a high-tech superpower with a presence in the fields of communications, radio-communications, satellite and many other high-tech industries, as well as in water use, desert agriculture and many other industries. Israel and its people have established a remarkable track record of success and achievement and a contribution to the world's technology which is quite extraordinary for a country with a population which is only just under eight million.

The success of the state of Israel is tied up very much with the life of Ariel Sharon. He was one of the founding figures of that nation. He was a lion of Israeli politics. He was a man very much to be admired. I join with many other parliamentarians in expressing my condolences to the people of Israel at the loss of a great leader of their nation.

Eric Hutchinson (Lyons, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Some saw former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon as a butcher, some saw him as a saint but history could well judge him as his country's saviour. Those are not my words, but I echo those of former Israeli newspaper editor-in-chief David Landau, who wrote a definitive biography of Sharon, published, interestingly, in the United States the day before the former Israeli leader died, on January 11 this year, after spending eight years in a coma and just short of his 86th birthday. Landau also said that Sharon's reputation was tarnished over the years by claims of self-interest but, despite the knee-jerk negative reaction to the man in many liberal and literary circles, Sharon regarded the land of Israel as his responsibility and worked all his military and political life to take care of it and its people.

Sharon was one of Israel's most controversial figures but holds a special place in the country's history. He was a commander in the Israeli army from its creation in 1948 and was considered the greatest field commander in the country's history and one of Israel's greatest military strategists. As a politician he became known as the Bulldozer because of his contempt for his critics and his ruthless drive to get things done. Yet, against the wishes of the country's hard Right, he orchestrated Israel's unilateral disengagement from the Gaza Strip. He was effective because he was firstly a pragmatist. He lost the confidence of his party over this, formed a new party and was expected to win the next election, as he planned to clear Israel out of the West Bank. But he suffered a massive stroke on 4 January 2006 that left him in a permanent vegetative state until his death this year.

Sharon loved his country, he loved his people and he was a man of his time, both in war and in peace. In his political life as well as his military career he was indeed courageous. Decisions like the one to pull out of the West Bank were based on a love of the Jewish state and of its people. He was a man who made many contributions, both military and diplomatic, such as the establishment of a free trade agreement between the US and Israel, and he showed an ability to get things done, sometimes at a great personal cost. I note also the recognition that was given to the work that he did bilaterally with his former adversary Egypt in developing agriculture and agricultural research between those two countries.

Given the eight years that were lost to him while he lay in a coma, we might well have been commending him today as Israel's political saviour. Of the things that I have read about his life, perhaps what struck me most were the words of his long-time personal secretary, Marit Danon, who described him as 'a lonely, gently flirtatious, highly verbal widower with a lust for food'—something that I could recognise—'and, though he understood that leadership was synonymous with lonesomeness, a constant and endearing tug toward the company of others'. May he rest in peace.

Kelly O'Dwyer (Higgins, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise today to speak about one of the most provocative and imposing figures in modern Middle Eastern history. No-one can deny that Ariel Sharon left his mark on the region. Equally, no-one can deny his passion for his country. Born in 1928 in what was then the British mandate of Palestine, Sharon made his career in the Israel Defense Forces. By the time of Israel's modern-day inception in 1948, Sharon had risen to the ranks of commander. Sharon was later described as one of the greatest commanders in Israel's history after successes in the 1948 War of Independence, the 1956 Suez War, the Six-Day War and the Yom Kippur War. During the War of Independence he survived being shot in the groin, stomach and foot. He left the IDF a highly decorated soldier.

Shortly after retiring from the army he embarked upon a political career. He was instrumental in helping to establish the Likud Party, a party he would later lead. His political career was not without controversy. In 1981, after helping lead Likud to election victory, he was rewarded by being named the Minister for Defense. It was during his time as the defense minister that he launched Operation Peace for Galilee, which later evolved into the 1982 Lebanon war. The purpose of the operation was to rid Lebanon of the PLO after the shooting of the Israeli ambassador in London. However, the war is remembered more for the Shatila massacre, a massacre conducted by the Phalangist militia upon civilians in the Shatila refugee camp. The massacre outraged many in Israel, and in a show of democratic force the Israeli government formed the Kahan commission. The inquiry concluded that, despite the massacre being conducted by the Lebanese militia, the IDF were indirectly responsible and, as defense minister, Sharon was ultimately answerable.

Sharon would later relinquish his role as defense minister but remain in the cabinet. Many thought that this was the end of his political career, but those critics were wrong. Sharon's appetite to serve his country never wavered, and in 2000 he campaigned to be prime minister. It was during this campaign that Sharon performed his second controversial political act. Surrounded by hundreds of guards he visited the Dome of the Rock Al-Aqsa Mosque, the holiest place to Jews and the third holiest place in Islam. This action was used by terrorists as a trigger for the second intifada and a wave of suicide bombs that followed. However, it was clear that the planning for this intifada was well underway before the visit. Sharon won that election. Many in Israel are very grateful that he did as a strong leader was needed in a very dark time in Israel's history.

Prime Minister Sharon surprised many with his tact and international diplomacy. He was the first Israeli Prime Minister to visit India and he had open dialogue with Russia—a country that had often supported Israel's enemies. However, it was his willingness to reach out to the Palestinian Authority that confounded his critics and supporters alike. After previously supporting the expansion of settlements, it was under Sharon's leadership that Israel disengaged from Gaza, handing over control to the Palestinian Authority. This angered many hardliners in Israel including many in his own party. However, this demonstrated to those at home and in the international community his willingness to reach over the fence for the sake of peace.

In 2005 Sharon resigned as the leader of Likud after internal dissent over his disengagement in Gaza and he created a new party called Kadima. Tragically, Sharon suffered a stroke in the lead-up to the 2006 election—an election he was favoured to win. No-one will ever know what path Israel would have taken had he won that election. The stroke left Sharon in a coma for eight years and, after eight years of lying motionless, Sharon ultimately passed away. He was a colossal figure that left an indelible mark on the region. No matter what your views of Ariel Sharon, no-one can deny his passion for his country and his people. He was a powerful leader who only ever wanted what he thought was best for the safety and security of his nation, Israel. Not without controversy, he managed to reach out to his one-time enemy, putting history behind him in the pursuit of peace, and for this he must be admired. Ariel Sharon, rest in peace.

Michael McCormack (Riverina, National Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Finance) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I commend the member for Higgins for her fine words and eloquent speech. This is an important condolence motion. Ariel Sharon was the giant of Israel and Israeli, and indeed global, political life. As a soldier and a statesman, Sharon was a warrior to the end. Born on 27 February 1928 in Kfar Malal in what was then Palestine but is now part of Israel, Ariel Sharon was a leading figure in Israeli military operations for decades, most notably in the 1967 Six-Day War and the 1973 Yom Kippur War.

He also demonstrated that it is possible for a soldier in wartime to become a champion of peace. A founding member of the Likud party and later the Kadima party, he served as defense minister, industry minister and ultimately in 2001 as Prime Minister, over a period spanning more than 20 years, 1981 to 2006. His decision to pull out of the Gaza Strip in 2005 showed a great capacity to take unpopular decisions in pursuit of peace. The stroke he suffered in 2006 was a reminder that even the great amongst us are only human. After eight years in a coma, Sharon died on 11 January 2014 at the age of 85.

Over the course of his life Ariel Sharon saw the establishment of the modern Jewish state and fought for its survival as a soldier and as a politician. It is now up to a new generation of leaders to resolve the tensions which continue to threaten the peace and the stability of that region. I hope that in my lifetime we finally see the two-state solution come to fruition to allow Israelis and Palestinians to coexist in peace and prosperity, sharing an area of the world that has special significance to them both. As the foreign minister noted in her comment to the House yesterday, the Australian government supports the resumed negotiations between Israel and Palestine and we welcome the leadership being shown by the United States of America in those negotiations, particularly the role of the Secretary of State, John Kerry. As the Deputy Prime Minister remarked on the day of Ariel Sharon's passing:

He was a controversial figure but undeniably a leader of conviction.

Vale, Ariel Sharon.

Brett Whiteley (Braddon, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Could I take this opportunity to add my condolences to the family of Ariel Sharon and to the people of Israel, whom Mr Sharon led not only as a military commander but as a political leader. I refer honourable members to a very poignant article in theAustralian Jewish News on the 15th which pretty well sums up the thoughts of members today. So I thank members today for their contribution.

Alannah Mactiernan (Perth, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I just want to acknowledge that whilst certainly Mr Sharon has been over his career a very controversial character, there is no doubt that his actions as Prime Minister in withdrawing from Gaza, and from entering into a genuine dialogue with the PLO, were indeed acts of great strength and insight. He recognised that for Israel to continue to prosper, and to experience the peace that the Jewish people have striven for, for millennia, there did need to be a resolution of the conflict between the communities in the area. No doubt it was his record in the military arena as a defender of Israel that gave him the political capital and the capacity to make what was a fiercely contested decision in Israel at the time. In that political role I think he has been a great role model for Israeli leaders. I would just hope that more people will draw inspiration from the attitude and the stance that he adopted.