What does it matter that his rocket's destination -- unless it's as a permanent talking head at a place like MSNBC -- may be oblivion?
Mr. Sharon has made clear that he wants to defer permanent peace talks into the indefinite future.
With surprising frankness, he said the interim issues had taken too much time and annoyingly distracted negotiators from the more important permanent peace talks.
As the head of Israel's team in the "permanent status" talks that are now, at last, to get under way, Mr Sharon suggested this week that he would try to steer away from any territorial discussion at all.
In the view of many Israelis, giving back land near Jerusalem under the interim agreement would be premature since the final status of Jerusalem is under negotiation in the permanent peace talks.
Leading Damascus-based Palestinian rejectionists, including Abu Ali Mustafa of Georges Habash's Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and Naʾif Hawatmeh, leader of the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine, waived their long-standing opposition to the principle of peace with Israel, and Mustafa returned to Gaza, hoping to influence the outcome of the permanent status talks.
Notable among these was the May 1999 date set as a deadline for a third stage of Israeli military redeployments, an end of the interim period, and a completion of "permanent status" talks on the most contentious issues such as the status of Jerusalem, the return of refugees, the presence of Israeli settlements in the occupied territories, and the issue of Palestinian sovereignty and statehood.
In the West Bank city of Ramallah, Saeb Erekat, the chief Palestinian negotiator, issued a general statement of appreciation for "efforts being exerted by President Obama with the objective of resuming the permanent status talks in the hope of reaching a final status agreement on all core issues, including Jerusalem and refugees and within a specified time frame".
Egypt is trying to broker a temporary humanitarian truce which would start during one of Islam's biggest celebrations following the fasting month of Ramadan, in the hope that it will facilitate more permanent ceasefire talks.
"An iron fist in a velvet glove?" When the ceasefire agreement was presented, it became clear that there were some weaknesses in the mechanisms that would make the agreement hold, and that would lead to more permanent peace talks.
