JERUSALEM, Israel (AFP) — Thousands of Israelis filed past the coffin of Ariel Sharon yesterday, paying respect to a former prime minister whose controversial life inspired admiration and provoked revulsion in equal measure.

Celebrated as a military hero at home, recognised as a pragmatic politician abroad, and despised as a bloodthirsty criminal by the Palestinians and the Arab world, Sharon was nothing if not a polarising figure.

But Israelis of all stripes acknowledged the burly 85-year-old as a key figure in their nation’s history, his death on Saturday leaving President Shimon Peres as the Jewish state’s last surviving founding father.

The white-haired former general had been in coma since January 4, 2006, following a massive stroke which felled him at the height of his political career.

Ahead of his funeral today, Sharon’s flag-draped coffin was placed on a black marble plinth in the plaza outside the Knesset, or parliament, for the public to pay their last respects.

A spokesman for the assembly told AFP up to 20,000 people had filed past the coffin, which was flanked by an honour guard, by 1700 GMT when the plaza was closed to the public after seven hours.

Earlier, ministers held a minute’s silence in memory of Israel’s 11th premier as they met for their weekly cabinet meeting.

“He will be remembered in the heart of the Jewish people forever as one of our most outstanding leaders and most daring commanders,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told them.

Sharon will be buried this afternoon at Sycamore Ranch, his home in the southern Negev desert, after a military funeral at

1200 GMT.

A procession from the Knesset to the ranch will pause for a ceremony at a military memorial site in Latrun, west of Jerusalem, where Sharon was wounded in the 1948 war of independence.

With thousands of people expected to attend the funeral, police were preparing to deploy extra units to secure the area, which lies just a few kilometres (miles) from the northern border with Gaza.

World leaders sent condolences over Sharon’s death, remembering the divisive figure in cautious diplomatic language. US Vice-President Joe Biden is expected to represent Washington at a special memorial at the Knesset on Monday morning.

He was long considered a pariah for his personal but “indirect” responsibility in the 1982 massacre of hundreds of Palestinians by Israel’s Lebanese Phalangist allies in Beirut’s Sabra and Shatila refugee camps.

His early career as a warrior earned him the moniker “The Bulldozer” but most world leaders chose to remember the politician who surprised many by masterminding Israel’s pullout from Gaza in 2005. He was elected prime minister in 2001. It seemed he was on his way to an easy re-election when he suffered the stroke in January 2006.

Settler leaders, who saw him as a powerful fatherly figure prior to the pullout, were reserved in their eulogies.

As one of Israel’s most famous generals, Sharon was known for bold tactics and an occasional refusal to obey orders.

Historians credit him with helping turn the tide of the 1973 Mideast war when Arab armies launched a surprise attack on Israel on the solemn fasting day of Yom Kippur, causing large Israeli casualties.