Sharon tries to regroup after plan's defeat
Aide: Despite setback, disengagement 'unstoppable'
JERUSALEM (CNN) -- A day after his own party voted down his disengagement plan in a nonbinding referendum, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said Monday that he will consult with his Cabinet, his party and other parties on how to proceed.
Sharon said after the Likud party vote Sunday that he "respected" the result but would not resign.
Likud members rejected Sharon's plan to pull Jewish settlements out of Gaza and parts of the West Bank by a 20-point margin.
Meeting with lawmakers at the opening of the summer term of Israel's parliament, the Knesset, Sharon said the Israeli people elected the Knesset to find peace and security, and said that is what he intends to do.
Raanan Gissin, a top Sharon adviser, said Sharon remains committed to disengagement and is checking options, including possible changes to the proposal. Gissin said any new initiative will be based on the principles of the existing disengagement plan and on the commitments that Israel has given the United States.
Among Sharon's options is modifying his plan enough to get it through the Knesset.
Other options include resigning and calling for new elections, or putting the plan to a vote of the entire Israeli electorate.
Official results released by Likud early Monday showed about 60 percent against the plan and only 40 percent in favor.
About 52 percent of Likud's roughly 200,000 members cast ballots, a proportion considered low.
One of Sharon's closest aides, Deputy Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, said Monday that despite the landslide defeat among Likud members, the idea of disengagement is "unstoppable."
President Bush strongly backed Sharon's plan, and White House aides played down the significance of Likud's rejection.
"A lot of things can happen," said National Security Council spokesman Sean McCormack, who described the impasse as a "domestic Israeli question."
He added that staff-level discussions are taking place between the Bush administration and the Israeli government.
In addition to approving Sharon's plan, Bush has sided with Sharon on a key Palestinian demand -- what Palestinians call the "right of return" to lands taken from them or abandoned in 1948 -- saying Palestinians must settle in a Palestinian state, not Israel.
Bush also signaled support for Sharon's plan to keep some West Bank settlements, saying final negotiations on the West Bank must recognize that "realities on the ground" have changed.
Israel seized the West Bank from Jordan and Gaza from Egypt in 1967 during the Six-Day War and began building settlements soon after in those areas. There are now about 230,000 Israelis living in West Bank settlements, and Gaza is home to about 7,500 Jewish settlers.
Palestinians have criticized Israel's new plan, charging Sharon is attempting to circumvent the negotiations called for in the so-called road map to Middle East peace, which is supported by the United States, the United Nations, the European Union and Russia.
Deadly attack
On Sunday, a pregnant woman and her four children were killed near a block of Jewish settlements in Gaza. The Popular Resistance -- an amalgamation of several Palestinian groups -- claimed responsibility. (Full story)
Sharon, in a statement after the attack and before voting closed, said the "brutal crime" was meant to stir anger against the withdrawal plan.
"The disengagement plan is a harsh and painful blow to the Palestinians. The Palestinians will do everything to prevent its being accepted," Sharon said.
"Today's terrible murder is the Palestinian way of rejecting and disrupting the plan. We will fight terror and do our utmost to prevent such incidents from recurring and, therefore, I will fight for my plan."
CNN's Yoav Appel and John Vause contributed to this report.
