● ISRAEL. Decision near on removing Sharon from all sedation. Doctors were thinking of ending Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon?s sedation yesterday in the boldest bid yet to rouse him from an induced coma and assess brain damage caused by a massive stroke, medical sources said. A week into a health crisis that has cast a pall over Middle East peace prospects, the 77-year-old leader remained unconscious and in a critical condition despite displaying basic physical reflexes as his anaesthetic was gradually reduced. Surgeons tending to Sharon were expected to decide when to stop the intravenous drip completely at a daily consultation yesterday morning, the medical sources said. ?The decision to end sedation outright requires a major deliberation,?a source said. A hospital spokesman said Sharon would undergo a new brain scan later in the day. Even with Sharon off the drugs, it could be days before doctors can assess the extent of the damage he suffered from a Jan. 4 brain haemorrhage. With his hospital stay predicted to last months more, Sharon?s political career may well be over. As Israelis kept vigil for the former army general, the first cracks formed in a moratorium on campaigning before March 28 national elections that he had been favoured to win easily with his new centrist Kadima party.