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Israel's ex-PM Ariel Sharon dies

Former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has died aged 85 after spending eight years in a coma following a stroke.

He was a giant of Israel's military and political scene, but courted controversy throughout his long career.

The head of the Sheba Medical Centre near Tel Aviv said Mr Sharon had died on Saturday afternoon of heart failure.

He fell into a coma in 2006 little over a year after completing a unilateral withdrawal from the Gaza Strip.

The BBC's Kevin Connolly, in Jerusalem, says Ariel Sharon's life was intimately entwined with the life of the country he loved.

He fought in Israel's war of independence in 1948, and from that point until he slipped into a coma in 2006 it seemed there was hardly a moment of national drama in which he did not play a role, our correspondent says.

The 85-year-old became PM in 2001.

His health had declined for the past week and a half, Sheba Medical Centre Director Professor Shlomo Noy told reporters.

"Over the past week he struggled with surprising strength and determination against the deterioration in his condition. Today he departed peacefully with his loving family at his side."

He had been in a persistent vegetative state since a stroke in 2006 and Professor Noy said he had suffered "ups and downs" throughout that period.

As prime minister, Mr Sharon presided over some of the most turbulent times in Israeli-Palestinian history, a Palestinian uprising that erupted in 2000 and an Israeli military crackdown after peace talks collapsed.

To many Israelis, Mr Sharon was a heroic warrior, having led decisive campaigns in the 1967 and 1973 wars.

In a tribute, current Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said "his memory will live forever in the nation's heart", his spokesman said on Twitter - sumber.