By Justin Webb
BBC News, Washington

The White House has been unusually sharply critical of one of the president's most prominent supporters, religious broadcaster Pat Robertson.

Mr Robertson suggested Ariel Sharon's stroke was divine punishment for the withdrawal of Israeli settlers in Gaza.

A White House spokesman described the broadcaster's remarks as "wholly inappropriate and offensive".

The remarks were also immediately attacked by the Democrats and American Jewish groups.

Evangelical Christians are an important part of the president's core support and generally the White House avoids attacking them, even when Mr Bush does not agree with what they say.

But Mr Robertson is too big a figure in American politics to be ignored.

Mr Robertson, who once stood for the Republican presidential nomination, has many friends in high places.

President Bush's former attorney-general teaches at his university and Mr Robertson has an evening television programme with a million viewers.

He told them that he had met and prayed with Ariel Sharon and regarded him as a good friend, but God wanted Israel to be whole and undivided.

"You read the Bible: This is my land, and for any prime minister of Israel who decides he's going to carve it up and give it away, God says no, this is mine," he said.

The White House evidently felt that a formal mark of its displeasure was in order.
The president's spokesman, Trent Duffy, said Mr Robertson's views were "wholly inappropriate and offensive" and did not really have any place in this, or any other, debate.

Not for the first time in recent months, elements on the Republican Party's religious wing are causing it embarrassment.

BBC News

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Russell Wilcox is a retired college professor who spends several months in Florida and several months in Rhode Island each year, and whose interests include boating and sailing, political activism, ballroom dancing and bridge. He has an MBA from Harvard, a Computer Systems CAGS from Bryant and a BS from Northeastern. He has worked in industry for EG&G and Texas Instruments, operated his own business with more than 200 employees, and served as Director of the Computer Information Systems Program for Stonehill College. He is a published author of two technical studies, and is the proud father of four children and the proud grandfather of six grandchildren. A holder of two patents in microchip connections and a true product of the melting pot, his father is the son of a Yankee farmer, and his mother the second generation daughter of Italian immigrants who retained their culture, but strove mightily to become Americans, sending four sons to fight against Hitler and Mussolini.