No Israeli has had such an enormous impact on the modern history of his nation. He was the pivotal Israeli in virtually all of the pivotal moments of Israeli history going back 40 years. And his legacy will shape Israel’s future and the future of the Middle East.

Like Yitzhak Rabin, Sharon was a “sabra,” one of the first Israeli leaders born in Palestine. (A “sabra” is a fruit native to the region; the term is used to describe native-born Israelis.) He held commands during the 1948 War of Independence and the ill-fated Suez expedition of 1956 and was the leader of Israel’s first major paratroop and commando units.

He was a division commander during the dashing 1967 war, when Israel took just six days to defeat Egypt, Jordan, and Syria. Sharon’s breakthrough at Abu Ageila left the whole Sinai peninsula open to Israeli conquest.The 1967 war left Israel in control of Sinai and what we now call the Occupied Territories: mostly the Egyptian Gaza Strip and the Jordanian West Bank.

Sharon expected to be named chief of staff soon. But sometime in the summer of 1973 he learned that he was going to be passed over. He angrily resigned and announced in a press conference that he intended to help lead the Right-Center coalition that was then taking shape to oppose the Labor party, which had ruled Israel since its inception.

Just days later, Egypt and Syria launched the most devastating blow that the state of Israel has ever received. The Yom Kippur War must be regarded as by far the most brilliant military operation conducted by any Arab armies since antiquity. Egypt’s new leader, Anwar Sadat, began with carefully defined and carefully limited objectives. He devised a strategy to overwhelm the thin Israeli defenses along the Suez Canal with a tightly executed series of crossings-in-strength. The entire advance was to occur under the umbrella of Egypt’s new arsenal of Soviet air-defense missiles.

Sadat had little intention of sweeping across the Sinai peninsula. He meant only to overwhelm Israel’s forward defenses and capture enough territory on the other side of the Suez Canal to break the diplomatic impasse over the peninsula’s return and push Israel to the negotiating table. Nevertheless, the superbly well-prepared Egyptians inflicted such enormous losses on Israeli forces that Sadat soon found himself with more territory than he knew what to do with.

The first Israeli counterattack petered out. Panic began to spread through Israel. But time was in Israel’s favor. Within a week the national mobilization was starting to produce large numbers of reinforcements, just as a massive American resupply was starting to deliver weapons and ammunition of every description.

Sharon was reactivated to take command of an Israeli brigade and found himself once again at the center of the Sinai front. In a maneuver reminiscent of Napoleon’s victory at Austerlitz in 1805, Sharon attacked the very center of the enemy front, aiming at the seam between two large formations, then pressed on across the Suez and, once he was well to the rear of the enemy, moved to encircle one-half of the enemy force. The Israelis soon surrounded Egypt’s Third Army — the pride of its military.