> So is the fact that Ariel Sharon is now speaking in support of the
> rights of Palestinians to a state of their own a positive sign or a
> negative sign?
Neither. It's all about semantics. No one in Likud was ever willing to give the Palestinians an entity that could reasonably be called a state. But as Prime Minister, Sharon was in favor of *calling* it a state, out of pragmatism.
The rest of his party is not so pragmatic.
Seth