Prime Minister Sharon attacked the Yesha Council\'s call, saying that he will not accept its demand to declare war. \"To take this nation to war today would be a mistake of the first-degree,\" he said at a meeting of coalition factions today. \"There are many things that we have to do - but not to take the nation to war. There are times where there is no choice, but this is not the case at present.\"
The Prime Minister said that the PA\'s ceasefire violations are constantly on the increase, and that Arafat has neither stopped the incitement nor arrested terrorists. \"There is a limit to Israel\'s ability to hold back,\" he continued. \"Israel will stand on every dot of the Tenet agreement, and will not implement the next steps of the agreement until the Palestinians fully carry out the previous steps.\" MK Tzvi Hendel told Arutz-7\'s Yosef Zalmanson that he very much hopes that Sharon has not trapped himself into the position of \"threatening not to fulfill the Tenet agreement instead of threatening an actual offensive against terrorism. I hope that he is merely posturing himself and the nation for the time, not far away, when the entire country will understand that the only option we have is to fight terrorism head-on and dismantle the Palestinian Authority. I do not agree with him, however, that it has to take this long to \'educate\' the country on this point...\"
The Prime Minister said that the PA\'s ceasefire violations are constantly on the increase, and that Arafat has neither stopped the incitement nor arrested terrorists. \"There is a limit to Israel\'s ability to hold back,\" he continued. \"Israel will stand on every dot of the Tenet agreement, and will not implement the next steps of the agreement until the Palestinians fully carry out the previous steps.\" MK Tzvi Hendel told Arutz-7\'s Yosef Zalmanson that he very much hopes that Sharon has not trapped himself into the position of \"threatening not to fulfill the Tenet agreement instead of threatening an actual offensive against terrorism. I hope that he is merely posturing himself and the nation for the time, not far away, when the entire country will understand that the only option we have is to fight terrorism head-on and dismantle the Palestinian Authority. I do not agree with him, however, that it has to take this long to \'educate\' the country on this point...\"