Police prepare for historic exodus from Gaza Strip 

Jewish men pray at the Western Wall in Jerusalem's Old City. Picture / Reuters

JERUSALEM - A momentous week for Israel starts tomorrow as 42,000 troops and police prepare to evacuate 8500 Jewish settlers in a move which reverses more than 30 years of fostering settlements in the Gaza Strip.

The historic move will begin tomorrow when troops will close the main Kissufim road into Gush Katif, the largest settlement block in Gaza, and begin visiting all 1500 homes with orders for the families living there to leave within 48 hours.

All those who remain past Wednesday morning will be forcibly evacuated in an operation which has divided the country's dominant political right and is the biggest gamble Ariel Sharon has taken since becoming Prime Minister over four years ago.

The Gaza withdrawal is the first ever abandonment of settlements in Palestinian land established since 1967 and was ordered by Sharon, the man who probably did more than any other politician to encourage settlement growth.

An estimated 2700 pro-settler infiltrators have managed to get into Gush Katif, Gaza's largest settlement block in recent weeks despite military restrictions. Police sources have indicated they will show "zero tolerance" for infiltrators, some of whom are young hard-liners from the West Bank.

An elaborate concentric structure of police and troops has been established under five divisional command centres.

The first "ring" will consist of police and troops charged with actual removal of the settlers from their homes. The second, of troops only, will seek to prevent anti-disengagement protesters reaching the settlements, as their leaders have threatened to try and do on Monday.

The third and fourth rings are intended to protect both troops and the departing settlers from any attacks by Palestinian militants in Gaza that may occur despite a series of assurances from most armed factions that they will not seek to disrupt the disengagement process.

The fifth and sixth will provide general security and traffic control around Gaza.

While military preparations for the evacuation are complete, and have been tested in a series of complex exercises, unresolved issues remain over the mechanics of the handover to the Palestinians and the extent to which Gaza's stricken economy will be boosted and given access to export markets after the settlers depart.

In talks brokered by the former head of the World Bank, James Wolfensohn, Israel agreed to destroy the settlers' homes and synagogues while leaving most other public buildings in place for future use. The Palestinians expect to get international help with removing the rubble.

Mr Wolfensohn also secured on Friday a US$14m deal under which 75 per cent of the flourishing greenhouse businesses of settlers will passed to the Palestinians via an international fund.

The Palestinians are pressing Mr Sharon's government to use high-tech security scanners at the Karni crossing into Israel, to allow lorries carrying produce to pass through quickly instead of having to unload and reload on each side.

The Palestinians have so far rejected Israeli plans to move the southern crossing point into Egypt, at least for goods, from the town of Rafah to Kerem Shalom, where the borders of Gaza, Egypt and Israel all meet.

Israel wants still to oversee the crossing, to prevent the smuggling of weapons, cheap goods and possibly drugs from Egypt.

Mr Abbas, who has urged the factions to let disengagement pass smoothly, is likely to have to cope with a power struggle over control of the land vacated by the settlers once disengagement is complete, even though the Palestinian Authority has decreed that only Palestinian, and not factional, flags can be flown in celebration.

There are fears that Hamas may try to seize tracts of the vacated territory to demonstrate that it can distribute it more fairly. Some international observers also believe that private claims to previously settler-controlled land may be greater than predicted. As little as half the land may be publicly owned.

Ismail Haniye, a top Hamas leader told reporters in Gaza City yesterday that the group will not lay down their guns in response to the evacuation.

In a clear attempt to take some credit for the disengagement in the face of Hamas claims that it is a retreat, Mr Abbas told a Palestinian rally on Friday: "From here, from this place, our nation and our masses are walking toward the establishment of an independent Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital."

- THE INDEPENDENT