London Observer: After all the threats, it's a muted goodbye to Gaza

[Jack Rabbit]

From the London Observer (Sunday supplement of The Guardian Unlimited)
Dated Sunday August 14

After all the threats, it's a muted goodbye to Gaza
The bags are packed, the villages are now all but deserted. Conal Urquhart and Inigo Gilmore report from Gaza where, from midnight, Israelis have 48 hours to leave their houses or face eviction
By Conal Urquhart and Inigo Gilmore in Gaza

Today in Gush Katif the religious Jews will fast, refrain from laughter and sex and avoid banal conversations to mark Tisha B'Av, the day of mourning for the fall of the Jewish temples in 586BC and AD70 and the expulsion of the Jews from Spain in 1492.

The symbolism of Tisha B'Av falling on the eve of the evacuation of 25 Jewish settlements in the Gaza Strip and northern West Bank is not lost on the mostly orthodox settlers. Then, the villains were the Babylonians, the Romans and the Inquisition.

Today the settlers blame the prime minister, Ariel Sharon and the Israeli left for what they see as the criminal forsaking of Jewish land rather than the legal policy of a democratic government.

For months the rhetoric of the opposition to Sharon's disengagement has verged on the violent, but now most settlers admit the battle is lost. All that remains is a symbolic show of resistance and last-minute haggling over compensation and resettlement.

Read more.

[madeline_con]

1. "... but now most settlers admit the battle is lost ..."

They don't want to be treated the way the Palestinians have been.

Ariel finally does one peaceful thing in his sorry life!

[Scurrilous]

2. Gaza sealed as disengagement begins

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/612075.html

<snip>

"Israel Defense Forces troops sealed off the Gaza Strip at midnight Sunday, marking the start of the withdrawal, the first time Israel will pull out of land Palestinians want for a future state. Forty-eight hours later, soldiers will begin forcibly removing those settlers remaining in the settlements.

Israeli authorities set up roadblocks across southern Israel and cut off bus service to the Jewish settlements in the Gaza Strip on Sunday as they began final preparations to begin dismantling all 21 settlements inside Gaza."

<snip>

"Police spokesman Avi Zelba said that authorities set up the cordon of roadblocks in southern Israel to prevent opponents of the disengagement from interfering with the pullout. Only residents of southern Israel and those with a legitimate reason for being there will be allowed to cross, police said.

The roadblocks are part of the sixth "ring" of security, for which the police is responsible, in the areas within the Green Line near Gush Katif. Police sources said Saturday that these roadblocks are likely to cause major traffic jams throughout the area."