Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has plans to relocate the some 8,000 residents of Gush Katif - 2,600 in N'vei Dekalim and the rest in 20 other smaller communities - in nearby Negev areas. So reports Maariv correspondent Shalom Yerushalmi, who adds that Sharon has no illusions that this will be carried out this year.
Mayors of the two regional councils that would be asked to accept the new residents in the event of such an eventuality have totally different opinions on the matter. Shmulik Rifman (Labor) of the Ramat Negev Council, who also chairs the Regional Councils Forum, said he cannot understand the Prime Minister: "Every time I go to Gush Katif, it excites me anew. I want to strengthen them. I can't understand all these announcements. The inhabitants of Gush Katif are also people, and I can't understand how they wake up each morning and hear something else about their future." He said that the Negev needs more people, true - "but I'm talking about hundreds of thousands. The 8,000 from Gush Katif aren't going to solve our problem."
On the other hand, Eshkol Regional Council head Uri Naamati, who is in favor of an Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, says he would be happy to absorb them. He said that the Gush Katif evacuees would be absorbed in existing towns, as well as in two new ones to be built in the desolate Halutza Sands area southeast of the Gaza Strip. Naamati is the father of the anarchist Gil Naamati, who was shot in the leg three weeks ago while violently demonstrating against the construction of the counter-terrorism partition fence.
Former Gaza Coast Regional Council head Araleh Tzur writes in response to the plan,
"We came to Gush Katif to build a town that is part of the State of Israel, and we are not willing to take part in the 'festivities of dismantling.' I have no problem being portrayed in the world as an 'enemy of peace' [because] I know our neighbors, their customs and their leaders. A move of this nature will lead to much bloodshed - but not to peace... We had hoped that with Sharon as Prime Minister, we would receive genuine deterrence power so that no one would dare raise his hand against a Jew. Instead, we received a cheap imitation of someone trying to find favor... The State of Israel was formed to build the Land of Israel under Jewish rule and to actualize the nation's ownership of its Land. I await the day that the Prime Minister of Israel will declare that the Nation of Israel is sovereign in its Land. We in Gush Katif raise the banner of settlement, and are determined to hold onto this land despite all the difficulties. We will continue to build and absorb new residents until the last of the defeatists realize that we mark Israel's border."