Sharon’s son to pen memoir

NEW YORK -- The youngest son of former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon is writing a book about his father. Gilad Sharon’s memoir, “Sharon: A Leader and a Father,” is tentatively scheduled to come out in 2010.

“Drawing from his father’s extensive archives, a remarkable cache of private papers and correspondence to which only he has access, Sharon provides a candid look at his father’s political legacy, surveying more than thirty years of leadership on a global stage,” publisher HarperCollins said Monday in a statement.

According to HarperCollins, Gilad Sharon will offer “memorable portraits” of President George W. Bush, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, former British Prime Minister Tony Blair and other leaders.

Ariel Sharon turned 80 in February, more than two years after he was rendered comatose by a stroke while serving in Israel’s top job.

Sharon made his name as a daring and often insubordinate army officer before turning to politics in the 1970s and becoming a hawkish lawmaker in the hard-line Likud Party and one of the most enthusiastic supporters of the Israeli settlement move- ment.

In a dramatic change of direction, he pulled all of Israel’s settlers and soldiers out of the Gaza Strip in 2005 while he was prime minister.

Sharon’s oldest son, Omri, 43, recently received a seven-month prison sentence after pleading guilty to illegal fundraising for his father’s 1999 successful election campaign to win the leadership of Likud. The two brothers oversaw parts of the campaign and fundraising.