Israel returns to politics as Sharon improves

updated 2:12 p.m. ET Jan. 12, 2006

JERUSALEM - Israel returned to politics Thursday as Prime Minister Ariel Sharon remained comatose a week after a massive stroke, with his allies jockeying for position and his main rival ordering his party’s ministers to quit the Cabinet.

The central committee of Sharon’s forsaken Likud party was expected to choose a list of candidates Thursday for March 28 national elections, with polls showing the party losing more than half its strength from the last vote — when Sharon was the leader. The same polls show the prime minister’s new party, Kadima, maintaining a huge lead despite — or perhaps helped by — his illness.

Sharon’s successor as Likud leader, ex-premier Benjamin Netanyahu, ordered his party’s Cabinet ministers to quit. But Israeli media reported that the four ministers would ignore the order, plunging the hard-line movement, already reeling from Sharon’s defection, into further disarray. Netanyahu had planned to withdraw the party from the government, but suspended the order following Sharon’s massive stroke Jan. 4.

Uncertainty over Sharon’s condition has clouded Kadima’s campaign plans.

A scan of Sharon’s brain showed some improvement Thursday, with the remnants of blood from his massive stroke last week having been absorbed, hospital officials said.

INTERACTIVE How strokes happen An interactive look at the causes and risk factors

As a result, doctors removed a tube they inserted into Sharon’s skull to relieve pressure on his brain, the statement from Hadassah Hospital said.

Sharon’s condition was unchanged Thursday — critical but stable, the hospital said. A statement said his heart rhythm was regular.

Earlier, Hadassah Hospital said doctors were attaching a new intravenous line into his leg in an effort to prevent infection.

'Slow and drawn-out process'
Sharon’s doctors said Wednesday they hoped to completely remove him soon from the sedatives that have kept him in a coma since the stroke — a process that could take a day and a half. Doctors said after the sedatives were stopped that it would be days, perhaps weeks, before a full picture of the damage from the stroke emerges.

“We’re talking about a long, slow and drawn-out process and we hope that it will always develop positively. It’s very hard to say what the pace will be,” Dr. Yoram Weiss said.

One of Sharon’s neurosurgeons, Jose Cohen, said most patients open their eyes within three weeks after sedation, and the sooner this happens, the better. However, Sharon was certain to have sustained some cognitive damage, he said.

“There will be changes, but what changes, nobody knows,” Cohen told Israel TV.

Sharon’s closest ally, Ehud Olmert, has taken over as acting prime minister. If Sharon is ruled permanently incapacitated, the Cabinet would have to pick a replacement until the election — probably Olmert.

Since Sharon’s stroke, Olmert has worked to project an air of stability, holding Cabinet meetings and assuring the country that the government was functioning normally. He spoke with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov on Wednesday and gave him an update on Sharon’s condition.

Olmert had previously been seen as an unlikely candidate for prime minister, but his calm stewardship of the crisis has turned him into the clear front-runner.

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