THE weekend headlines reminded me of something Ariel Sharon told us when came by The Post for a visit almost eight years ago.

Back then, he was yesterday’s news. He was on the outs with the government headed by Benjamin Netanyahu, a young and dynamic leader who seemed certain to dominate Israeli politics for decades to come.

During his visit, Sharon told us that for years he had been the go-to guy in Israel when it came time to conduct back-channel discussions with the Jordanians. “They know Arik can make a deal,” he said, “because when Arik agrees to deal with the Arabs, they know he’s not smiling for the cameras.”

What he meant was this: Because his political base was hostile to deal-making with Arabs, it would mean more to his hostile interlocutors if he agreed to a concession or sought to reach agreement on a sticking point. And because he was so tough, they would take it seriously when he played more gently.

At the time, this seemed like nothing more than vainglorious bluster – a has-been trying to make himself feel better about his powerlessness. But those words show that Sharon understood how he could use his own uncompromising image and approach to soften the terrain for a historic effort at peacemaking.

On Sunday, Sharon cleared the final domestic hurdle in his daring effort to disengage Israel from the Gaza Strip. The one-time has-been has now been prime minister for four years – and is now unquestionably revealed as the most nimble and brilliant politician Israel has ever seen.

On July 20, his government will begin evacuating 8,500 Jewish settlers from Gaza. The importance and impact of this painful decision can’t be understated, though many have tried and will continue to try.

It means nothing less than this: The most expansive version of the Zionist dream – a Jewish State that would extend from the Mediterranean Sea on the west to the Jordan River on the east – has now officially been put to rest by the politician whom the world has long directly associated with expansionist Zionism.

That’s not what Sharon was elected to do in 2001. He was elected to crush the intifada, and he spent three years leading a complex effort to do so.

That effort has involved harsh military tactics, selective assassinations and the construction of the security barrier along the West Bank that has succeeded beyond anyone’s wildest dreams in limiting the number of terrorist attacks inside Israel.

The intifada had to be defeated – it couldn’t be negotiated away. That was the harsh reality Sharon grasped – and that his counterparts on Israel’s Left couldn’t cope with. His willingness to make the hard choices and not live in a fantasy led him to victory in two historic landslides.

But as he was fighting the war, another harsh reality was making itself clear to Sharon and others on Israel’s right flank.

There was no escaping the numbers: If Israel continued to maintain its hold on lands in which Palestinians were the vast majority, it would be only a matter of two decades before the number of non-Jews living under Israeli rule was larger than the number of Jews in the Jewish state.

(That new study that supposedly proves the demographic threat is overstated? Sorry: Even if the numbers hold up, it buys you five years, 10 at the most.)

Sharon had sought to change the demographic reality 20 years earlier by trying to get Jews to populate the West Bank. His strategic bet (first placed by Labor governments a decade earlier) proved to be a loser. In the end the Israeli government just couldn’t will a Jewish majority into existence there.

Still, many West Bank settlements (especially those right near Jerusalem) are thriving suburban communities that have taken root and will never be removed. The Gaza settlements, by contrast, are a huge strategic liability, pure and simple.

The people who live there are undeniably brave and principled, but they have cost Israel more than Israel has gained by having them there. The state must dedicate huge resources to defending these tiny and tormented pockets of land surrounded by 1.5 million Arabs.

By unilaterally disengaging from Gaza, Sharon is taking a Zionist long view. He is trying to save Zionism for the generations to come. He has worked hard to secure unilateral disengagement because he believes it is in the deepest national interests of his country.

He has changed tactics and policies, but his heart is in the same place it always was: He is a patriot and a nation-builder.

Now he wants to see whether the Palestinians might have changed as well – whether, in the aftermath of Yasser Arafat’s death and the first truly democratic elections, the Palestinians are willing to join Ariel Sharon at long last in the real world.