The fierce fighting in Gaza that has left 13 Palestinians killed, including a 15-year-old, makes an odd backdrop to Ariel Sharon’s plan to uproot Jewish settlements and return the strip to full Palestinian control. Israeli gunships and tanks are being deployed, supposedly to root out militants. However, what is becoming, in Israel’s words, a pinpoint precision mission is turning into an indiscriminate massacre.
It appears the violence will continue for some time after it was reported that Israel intends to wait until after the US presidential elections in November before it removes Gaza settlements. With his hands full in Iraq and a clearly difficult election year, President Bush has apparently decided the time is not right for any involvement in the pullout. The delay only adds to speculation what this settlement withdrawal will look like. Months after Sharon, a long-time backer of the settler movement, stunned his supporters when he said the evacuation of 17 of the 21 Jewish settlements in Gaza would begin, Tel Aviv has still not decided the form that will take. A complete pullout is the most likely scenario, but other options are being considered, including a pullout of settlers only from the south Gaza Strip; maintaining control of the Gaza-Egypt border; and keeping an army presence.
Israel’s Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz has said that Israeli troops would not stay in Gaza — nor would they leave the area.
The multiple scenarios have forced the US to shift its position on the issue more than once. At first Washington said it opposed unilateral measures, which is what such a move would amount to, as being contrary to the road map. Washington then decided that since it has always said it was opposed to settlements, it cannot now oppose removing them. Several reports suggest Washington does not want settlers from the Gaza Strip moved en masse to the West Bank, and that a Gaza evacuation would not be an excuse for annexing territory elsewhere. These are key conditions, for the Palestinian fear is that Sharon is simply seeking to pull out from Gaza while consolidating his hold elsewhere.
Should this be Sharon’s goal, then this is not an evacuation as much as a relocation. In addition, an evacuation of settlers should not be confused with an evacuation of soldiers. Many of the strip’s army bases would not be removed under the so-called disengagement. Nor would the plan disengage the Israeli navy that blockades the coast off Gaza. The strip would be effectively besieged, with no Palestinian control over entry or exit, either by land or sea. It would be a settler-less occupation, but a continuing occupation nonetheless. If these are the “painful concessions” that Sharon constantly talks of, they are unlikely to douse the flames of anger now sweeping through Gaza.
