JERUSALEM, 25 October 2004 — The Israeli Cabinet approved yesterday a compensation package for settlers who are set to be uprooted from their homes on the eve of a crunch debate on Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s plan to pull out of the Gaza Strip.
The legislation was approved by 13 votes to six, giving the premier a major boost ahead of a vote by MPs this week on his so-called disengagement plan which has been fiercely resisted by settlers and rightwing members of Sharon’s own Likud party.
In the Gaza Strip itself, two Palestinian fighters from the Islamic Jihad were killed in an Israeli air strike overnight.
The pair were hit by a missile fired by a helicopter gunship or an unmanned aircraft about 300 meters from an Israeli settlement in the southern Gaza town of Khan Yunis.
Sharon has been trying to deliver a knockout punch to the militants in Gaza, eager to counter criticism that the pullout will merely serve to strengthen armed factions fighting the Israeli occupation.
The bill approved yesterday will give the government the power to issue evacuation orders to the settlers and allows for anyone who tries to either remain in Gaza or block the pullout to be jailed for up to three years.
It also lays down the terms of compensation, agreed on by Sharon’s inner cabinet on Sept. 14, which are likely to see families receive between $200,000 to $300,000 in compensation.
“The law will, as much as possible, ease conditions for the settlers who are to be evacuated and I am certain that even those who oppose the disengagement plan will not want to make things difficult for the settlers,” Sharon told his ministers.
Under the terms of disengagement, all 8,000 Jewish residents of the Gaza Strip as well as several hundred settlers from four enclaves in the northern West Bank are to be evacuated next year.
Five of the ministers who voted against the bill were members of Sharon’s own Likud faction, underlining the rifts that the project has created within Israel’s main rightwing party.
Sharon has warned that he will sack any member of his government if they vote against the disengagement plan on Tuesday after a two-day debate in the Israeli parliament, or Knesset. Pundits predict that Sharon will win around 66 votes in the 120-seat chamber, including the support of MPs from the leftwing Labor and Yahad parties.
