JERUSALEM, 18 April 2004 — Israel is threatening to demolish its settler homes in the Gaza Strip during its planned withdrawal of the territory unless it wins assurances that they will not be turned over to the families of Palestinian fighters.
It is also negotiating with the World Bank for compensation for its “real estate assets” in 18 settlements in Gaza.
Withdrawal from Gaza will be completed by 2005, according to details of Ariel Sharon’s unilateral disengagement plan unveiled Friday.
The Israeli prime minister’s plan also covers the evacuation of four settlements in the West Bank and the completion of the separation barrier Israel is building there.
Homes built for 7,500 settlers in the Gaza Strip will be left intact, Israeli government officials said, on condition they are handed over to Palestinian refugees. “We want the houses to go to refugees, and if they don’t we reserve the right to destroy them,” an official said.
Under the plan, Israel will withdraw its troops from all of Gaza except for the border zone with Egypt, which may be expanded.
Israel has already demolished more than 600 Palestinian homes in the Rafah refugee camp. It will also retain full control of the Erez border crossing, the only point at which Palestinians can cross into Israel. Gaza’s airspace would remain under Israeli control, and Israel’s navy would continue to patrol its coastline.
Israel says it would reserve the right to invade Gaza for security reasons.
The plan, which was released as Sharon returned from meeting US President George W. Bush in Washington, states that Israel believes there is no Palestinian partner for negotiations but believes it must act to take the country out of its current stagnation.
Bush dismayed Palestinians by strongly backing the plan.
A majority of the settlers in Gaza are ideologically committed to their homes and will resist evacuation.
However, a large proportion of the 500 settlers in Ganim, Kadim, Homesh and Sar Nur on the West Bank will agree to a move if they receive adequate compensation.
The plan envisages a Palestinian enclave in the northern West Bank around Jenin, which will be partially enclosed by the security barrier. According to Israeli press reports, Sharon has made it clear that he plans to evacuate a further two settlements, Mevo Dotan and Hermesh, to increase the size of the enclave.
The Israeli government has also promised to honor commitments that it made to the US last year to freeze building in the West Bank settlements and evacuate 20 illegal outposts within the coming weeks. Most are uninhabited but the largest, Migron, has a population of about 200.
Before the plan is enacted, Sharon must first persuade his Likud party to support it in a referendum on May 2 before putting it before the Israeli Cabinet.
Bush’s backing has persuaded many members of Likud to support Sharon but the right of the party remains against any withdrawal. Two newspaper polls of Likud members published Friday suggested that Sharon had the support of more than half the 200,000 party members.
Uzi Landau, a minister without portfolio, said that Bush had not offered Israel anything new and described the president’s comments as “pretty words, weak recompsense”. The right sees any withdrawal as a reward for militancy; that view is reflected by Palestinian hard-liners who see it as a victory for their resistance.
Analysts believe that if Sharon wins the referendum the Cabinet will approve the plan, although three rightwing ministers from the National Union and the National Religious parties will resign.
Sharon would then have to form a new government with the Labour party or hold a general election.
Michael Tarazi, a legal adviser to the PLO, said: “The settlers are being moved. This will allow, in Gaza at least, Palestinians to travel freely and develop businesses. But ultimately this will just create one large open prison. It will bring Gaza up to the status of Ramallah. This is an improvement but it’s hardly a cause for celebration.”
Critics on the Israeli left were even harsher. A column on the front page of the Israeli daily Ha’aretz, argued that Sharon’s disengagement plan was identical to the creation of autonomous black homelands in apartheid-era South Africa.
The Irish foreign minister, Brian Cowen, whose country holds the EU presidency, said Friday that Europe remained committed to the road map peace proposals for the Middle East despite Bush’s backing for Sharon’s plan.
He emphasized that no matter what Israel offered or Washington recommended, any deal would require Palestinian acceptance.
“It remains the case that Israel has to make peace with its enemies, not its friends,” Cowen said.
Demonstrators burned effigies of the two leaders in the West Bank city of Ramallah, and loudspeakers exhorted thousands of protesters with chants of “Sharon and Bush are pigs” at a rally in the Jabalya refugee camp in the Gaza Strip.
Israeli forces arrested a Palestinian woman carrying a 10kg bomb in a bag Friday, the military said. Members of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade said they gave explosives to a man from a village near the West Bank city of Nablus, who had passed the bomb on to Fatten Daraghmeh, a 28-year-old mother of six.
