How fitting.

It is rare in Israel for leaders to have a site named for them while they are still alive. It is more bizarre for the object of dedication to be a colossal garbage dump, for decades the country's most conspicuous - and smelliest - eyesore.

But on Sunday, in the hazy light of afternoon, the president, prime minister, senior politicians, mayors and business leaders plan to gather on this flat-topped brown mound, known as Hiriya, on the outskirts of Tel Aviv, just by Ben-Gurion International Airport, and name it the Ariel Sharon Park.

This is an unusual yet fitting honor for Sharon, the iconoclastic soldier and statesman, farmer and former prime minister, who suffered a crippling stroke in January 2006. Sharon, known familiarly as the Bulldozer, still lies in a coma in a hospital just visible from the top of the dump.

Of course, israelis insist that it's fitting because fighting "greedy" developers from developing that land was one of his final pet peeves, before going to Hell, where he belongs.

But, I can think of other infinitely more valid reasons why naming a garbage dump after Ariel "The Butcher" Sharon "fits" the pattern of his legacy.

Posted in

• Ariel Sharon
• Bulldozer
• Butcher
• Garbage
• memory
• perfect sense
• war criminal

• qrswave's blog
• Login or register to post comments