Israel braces for rightist Gaza march

Israeli police and troops fanned out in force around the Gaza Strip yesterday to prevent any last effort by Jewish settlers and their sympathisers to scupper this month's withdrawal from the occupied territory.

Ultranationalists streamed towards the southern Israeli border town of Sderot for the first leg of a two-day march against a pull-out plan they say betrays Jewish claims on biblical land and rewards a four-and-a-half-year-old Palestinian uprising.

The government at first banned the Sderot rally. Officials cited a risk of Palestinian rocket fire or that protesters could slip past an army blockade on Gaza and reinforce settlers who have sworn to resist evacuation slated to begin on August 17.

Relenting after late-night talks with the YESHA settler council, the government said a small-scale rally could go ahead on the understanding protesters would continue from Sderot to Ofakim, a town 20 kilometres from Gaza, and then disperse.

Internal Security Minister Gideon Ezra said no more than 5,000 rightist demonstrators would be allowed into Sderot.

"If the number that turns up is far bigger than that set, they will be sent to Ofakim," he told Israel's Army Radio.

YESHA said it was keeping to an earlier plan to march from Ofakim on the main Gaza settlement bloc of Gush Katif, and face off with a buffer force of 15,000 police and soldiers.

"We'll continue to Ofakim as planned, and that night we'll prepare to go on towards Gush Katif. The only thing I can promise is that... the struggle will be determined but non-violent," senior YESHA official Pinchas Wallerstein said.

Mr Ezra voiced hope that YESHA would back down, as it did last month after police foiled a similar mass-march on Gaza by penning in protestors for three days in a desert encampment.

"They (settlers) want to set off (to Gush Katif). The police won't let them. They said they would listen to the instructions of police. I don't doubt that is how it will turn out," he said.

The rallies may be a last show of force against evacuations. Polls show that a narrow majority of Israelis support Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's vision of "disengaging" from conflict by quitting Gaza and a corner of the West Bank.

Calling on settlers to accept that the withdrawal was imminent and to start arranging alternative accommodation, Mr Sharon said that more than half those due to be moved out had applied for state-funded relocation assistance.

"Don't be tempted to believe the disengagement will not be carried out or that it will be delayed," Mr Sharon said.

Settlers who fail to go during a 48-hour grace period starting on August 15 could risk big cuts in compensation packages that total several hundred thousand dollars per family. Israel fears security forces could clash with recalcitrant settlers.

Palestinians welcome any withdrawal from land captured in the 1967 Middle East war, but fear the Gaza plan is a ruse to strengthen Israel's hold on the West Bank.

The pull-out affects 9,000 settlers, fewer than four per cent of the 240,000 who live alongside 3.8 million Palestinians.

The World Court has branded all settlements illegal. Israel disputes this. The United States has said Israel could expect to keep some settlements under any eventual peace deal.