| The political mouthpiece of the settler movement resigned from Ariel Sharon's coalition government yesterday after the Israeli prime minister refused to bow to demands to put his Gaza pullout plan to a national referendum. "I offered my letter of resignation as planned," Welfare Minister Zeev Orlev told Israeli television. Earlier in the day, Orlev laid out the reasons for his resignation and for the departure of his National Religious Party from the coalition at a press conference in Jerusalem. "We said, if there is a referendum, we will stay in government whatever the result, even if we lose the referendum," he said, acknowledging that the option had been rejected by Sharon. The NRP, one of three parties still in government, had set Sharon a two-week deadline to either call new elections or a referendum on his so-called disengagement plan after it won parliamentary approval a fortnight ago. |