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Israeli
troops began the forced evacuation on Wednesday of thousands of
Jewish settlers gripped by rage and anguish over their expulsion
from the Gaza Strip after nearly four decades of occupation.
Unarmed soldiers broke through burning barricades and marched door
to door ordering people out in six settlements while police pushed
protesters onto waiting buses.
"I don't want to. I don't want to," one woman wept as four female
soldiers, each grabbing a limb, carried her out of her home in Neve
Dekalim. Many settlers believe Gaza is part of the Land of Israel
bequeathed to the Jewish people by God.
In one synagogue ultranationalist youngsters who had slipped into
the settlement over the past few weeks sang the haunting melody
some Jews sang on their way to Nazi gas chambers.
Elsewhere settlers tearfully hugged soldiers before filing quietly
onto transport taking them to Israel.
The operation, the culmination of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's
plan for the first removal of settlements from land Palestinians
want for a state, began after a midnight deadline for Gaza settlers
to leave or face eviction.
Palestinians watched gleefully from nearby rooftops, some recalling
the loss of their own homes in Israeli raids in search of
militants.
Sharon, once the settlers' champion but now reviled by them as a
traitor, voiced sympathy for the evacuees in a televised address.
He urged them to blame him alone and not attack troops.
"I am responsible for this. Attack me," said Sharon, who has billed
his plan as "disengagement" from conflict with the
Palestinians.
But confrontation loomed as forces fanned out in the largest
enclave, Neve Dekalim, where the hundreds of ultranationalist
youths were holed up in a synagogue for a possible last
stand.
Some settlers scuffled with soldiers, and a woman was arrested for
stabbing and lightly wounding a soldier. A West Bank settler woman
set herself ablaze in protest at a police checkpoint outside the
Gaza Strip, suffering 60% burns.
"Guys, why are you doing this?" cried a man named Yehuda who stood
on his rooftop wearing his old military uniform in the Morag
settlement after troops, accompanied by bulldozers, made their way
past makeshift barricades and marched in.
Smoke from tyre and rubbish fires billowed over the area.
In Neve Dekalim, soldiers retreated from a house where residents
started shrieking and smashing glassware.
Army's biggest operation other than war
Seventeen-member evacuation squads had been training for weeks,
practising scenarios that included violent resistance. More than
50,000 police and soldiers were deployed in Israel's largest
military operation other than in wartime.
Government eviction notices went into effect on Monday but settlers
were given 48 hours to leave or be removed from all 21 settlements
in Gaza and four of 120 enclaves in the West Bank.
A Reuters photographer saw bulldozers move in and start demolishing
buildings vacated by settlers in the northern Gaza settlement of
Nissanit.
Taking heed of warnings, many of Gaza's 8,500 settlers packed up
trucks ahead of the Wednesday deadline to quit the Gaza Strip, home
to 1.4 million Palestinians, and joined an exodus ending Israel's
38-year occupation of the coastal area.
But the army estimated about half the settler population would
remain in defiance. Polls show most Israelis back the pullout but
rightist opponents call it a reward to Palestinian violence and a
betrayal of Israel's biblical birthright.
A hard core of 5,000 pullout opponents have reached Gaza
settlements in recent weeks despite a military closure.
From the roof of buildings in the nearby Palestinian town of Khan
Younis, residents watched gleefully as troops moved in.
"I feel like I could fly, I am so happy," said Abu Ahmed, a father
of 10 whose house was demolished by Israeli troops during a
five-year-old Palestinian uprising.
Palestinians welcome withdrawal from any land captured in the 1967
Middle East war. They also fear Sharon devised the plan as a ruse
to cement Israel's hold on most of the West Bank, where 230,000
settlers and 2.4 million Palestinians live.
Loosely coordinating with Israel, thousands of Palestinian security
men have deployed near Gaza settlements to ward off possible
militant attacks.
Israeli officials raised the prospect the army could finish
evacuation of settlers in as little as two days, speeding up an
operation the military had said it hoped to complete by September
4.
Four small Gaza settlements and two in the northern West Bank had
already evacuated on their own ahead of the deadline.
But signs of defiance remained. In Kfar Darom, a hardline religious
stronghold, many settlers vowed to stay put.
Officials say 66% of settler families have accepted compensation
deals. Those who refused to go could lose a third of the money,
ranging from $150,000 to $400,000 per family.
The army intends to pull out the last troops from Gaza in early
October, turning land they had struggled to protect from militant
attack over to the Palestinians.
The World Court describes Israel's settlements as illegal. Israel
disputes this.
