Sharon’s moment

THE BIGGEST WINNER IN Tuesday’s election in Israel will almost certainly never learn of his victory. Ariel Sharon lies comatose in a hospital in Jerusalem, unlikely ever to recover after suffering a massive stroke three months ago. But Kadima, the centrist party he founded after leaving the conservative Likud Party last year, won 28 of 120 seats in the Knesset, more than any other party -- an endorsement, if not a resounding one, of Sharon’s improbable legacy of moderation.

Kadima (it means “Forward”) supports the unilateral withdrawal from some Israeli settlements in the West Bank. A clear majority of Israelis supports withdrawal from the settlements, yet Kadima faces obstacles on every front. To govern, the party’s leader, Ehud Olmert, will have to form a coalition, probably with leaders of the liberal Labor Party and several smaller parties. It promises to be fractious. And the victory of the terrorist group Hamas in Palestinian elections in January will only make the peace process all the more difficult; Hamas remains dedicated to the destruction of the Jewish state.

Still, it’s worth pausing to note what Sharon hath wrought. First is the simple fact that neither Labor nor Likud, but a new party created to reflect the center of Israeli politics, will now govern Israel. Voters had plainly tired of the long-standing Likud-Labor slugfest, and it took the willful former general nicknamed “the Bulldozer” to create a new dynamic. As happened in Gaza, Kadima is now determined to preside over the dismantling of some of the very West Bank settlements whose construction Sharon oversaw as agriculture minister in the 1970s.

Debate over Sharon’s legacy will last at least as long as Sharon’s life (he turned 78 last month). But this much is undeniable: Israel is closer now to peace than it was when he took office in 2001. The question, as ever, is how to inch still closer to that goal.

Olmert, Sharon’s successor and the former mayor of Jerusalem, has promised to continue Sharon’s policy of “disengagement,” which he has renamed “convergence.” By any name, it is an imperfect but welcome development. Ideally, the Palestinians would be partners in the process of Israeli withdrawal from Gaza and the West Bank. But Hamas has shown no interest in negotiating with Israel. President Bush, for his part, has invited Olmert to the White House, an invitation that rightly will not be extended to the new Palestinian prime minister. Now that the Palestinian government is officially controlled by Hamas, the U.S. will have only limited contact with it, though Washington has pledged to continue its aid to Palestinians through other means.

It is a sensible yet vaguely unsatisfying policy. Perhaps the best thing that can be said about it is that it is flexible enough to allow Bush to change as circumstances warrant -- as Ariel Sharon did.