Netzarim, Gaza Strip – The last Jewish settlers to be evacuated from Gaza boarded armored buses and left for Israel today, after a farewell march behind Torah scrolls and a massive menorah.
As the historic Gaza withdrawal neared completion – and Israeli troops prepared to evacuate four settlements in the West Bank – Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said he would expand other large West Bank communities.
The settlers left Netzarim in a caravan of buses, with Israeli flags poking out of darkened, bulletproof windows, and private cars and trucks loaded with belongings. A settlement leader clutched a Torah as he sat in the front of the first bus to depart.
By late afternoon, the police commander overseeing evacuation, Hagai Dotan, said most of the settlers were on their way to Jerusalem.
More than 5,000 troops, meanwhile, headed to two militant West Bank settlements to be evacuated Tuesday. Security forces braced for confrontations, saying some 2,000 ultranationalist youths holed up there planned to resist violently. Security officials said militants had hoarded stun grenades and tear gas canisters, and planned to hurl burning tires onto rivers of cooking oil.
In Netzarim, one of Gaza’s oldest settlements, about 600 residents of the farming community put up no resistance after reaching an agreement with the military on a quiet departure – in contrast to the struggle put up last week in Neve Dekalim and Kfar Darom.
“It’s tougher to see them go quietly, not fighting,” Dotan said, watching the tearful and resigned settlers board the convoy.
After midday prayers, the settlers started heading out of Gaza in more than 30 armored buses for the Western Wall in Jerusalem, Judaism’s holiest shrine. From there, they were going to temporary homes in a West Bank settlement.
“We need a miracle so that we might stay here again tonight,” said Jonathan Weinberg, 21, who came to Netzarim from the West Bank settlement of Hashmonaim to reinforce the settlers.
While hundreds of residents took part in the goodbye procession, others found solace in continuing with their everyday lives. Even in their final hours at the settlement, workers poured concrete to create a foundation for the roof of the Meshulami family’s new house.
Netzarim, on the outskirts of Gaza City, has been the target of frequent attacks by Palestinian militants and was one of the coastal strip’s most hardline and isolated settlements. Throughout the past five years of fighting, an entire Israeli army battalion guarded Netzarim – about 550 soldiers or nearly one per settler.
Palestinians living near Netzarim said today they were counting the hours to see the settlers go.
“They are very bad neighbors,” said Saadi Helo, 44, a Palestinian farmer. “They turned our lives into nightmares. They occupied the land, leveled our farms, demolished our houses, killed our beloved and spared no effort to attack us.” Forces began evacuating the 21 Gaza settlements last week, more than a year after Sharon concluded Israel could no longer defend its 38-year-old occupation of the coastal strip, which Palestinians claim as part of a future state.
As troops prepared to wrap up the Israeli withdrawals, displaced settlers from Gaza were setting up two tent camps just outside the coastal strip today to protest what they said was the government’s failure to provide alternate housing, Army Radio said. Sharon has called the establishment of tent camps a political ploy to create sympathy, and insists there’s ample compensation and housing for evacuated settlers.
The pullout from Gaza and four small West Bank settlements is sure to reshape Mideast peace efforts in unpredictable ways. After the settlements are completely evacuated and demolished, Israel is to turn Gaza over to Palestinian control for the first time.
But while Palestinians and others in the international community are pushing for a quick renewal of talks, Sharon conditioned progress on a halt to Palestinian violence and said Israel would continue building in the West Bank, where most of its more than 240,000 settlers live.
Speaking to evacuating troops Sunday, Sharon said there would be no further unilateral withdrawals. The next step would be a return to the stalled internationally backed “road map” peace plan, he said – if his conditions were fulfilled.
“In order to move to the road map, terrorism must stop – terrorism, violence, incitement – terror organizations must be dismantled, their weapons confiscated, serious reforms carried out,” Sharon said.
A senior government official confirmed a Jerusalem Post newspaper report quoting Sharon as saying Israel would continue to build in the West Bank – a policy that has put him in conflict with the United States. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to comment on policy matters.
The newspaper quoted Sharon as saying the Ariel bloc, near Tel Aviv, “will remain a part of Israel forever, connected territorially to Israel.” The Maaleh Adumim bloc outside Jerusalem, he said, “will continue to grow and be connected to Jerusalem.” Sharon has said he hopes the Gaza pullout will help Israel hold on to the settlement blocs in any peace deal. The future of Jewish settlements outside those blocs, where far fewer Israelis live, is less certain.
The forcible evacuations in Gaza have proceeded far more quickly than expected, and with relatively little violence.
That could change as the evacuation operation turns northward to the West Bank. Residents have already pulled out of two of the four targeted settlements, but as many as 2,000 right-wing extremists – most non-residents – have holed up in the two others, Sanur and Homesh. Some 5,500 forces were to be deployed to those settlements to carry out the evacuations, police spokesman Avi Zelba said.
Palestinian security forces in the area of the settlements also were deploying, to prevent militant attacks during the pullout, Palestinian officials said.
On Sunday night, settlers burned down a military communications post near Homesh and slashed the tires of military vehicles that arrived at the scene. Since Sunday night, security forces have intercepted nearly 120 infiltrators trying to reach Homesh and Sanur to bolster the resistance, the military said.
“We hope that most of the weapons (in Homesh and Sanur) have been collected,” Public Security Minister Gideon Ezra told Israel Radio today. “We will deal with people with zero tolerance, and all those who try to face off with the army will ultimately find themselves in jail.”
