Gaza settlers, warned to pull up stakes, plan to dig in

Sharon is expected to present a more comprehensive view of what he has in mind to senior US officials here later this week. By packaging the proposed withdrawal from Gaza with an altered route of the separation barrier - 63 miles shorter than the original approved by the government, the Haaretz newspaper reported Sunday - Sharon's big picture may emerge as a more sellable one. Or so Sharon's office hopes.

Adviser Zalman Shoval says that the goal of the changed path of the barrier would be to alleviate suffering caused to Palestinians cut off from school, work and family.

Mr. Shoval says that the Gaza settlers, if evacuated, would not be moved en masse to the West Bank, but would have the option of moving to large, existing settlements that he says are already in the "national consensus" and are expected to be annexed to Israel anyway.

"The whole idea of withdrawals must be seen as part of an ... all encompassing concept. It's not just we're going to get out of Gaza," says Shoval. "That would be seen as a prize for terror. The prime minister is looking at withdrawal from Gaza as part of a wide-ranging plan to withdraw from territories as a whole."

Of the approximately 7,800 settlers in Gaza, Shoval says, some might want to move to Israel, or to start new communities in the underpopulated Western Negev in Israel's south, not far from here. Any settlers forced to leave their homes, he says, will have a choice of where they want to live - within limits. They will not be allowed to start new settlements in the West Bank, nor to move to small, indefensible ones - much less "illegal outposts" that many Israelis and Palestinians expect to be evacuated. "We do not think that giving these people the opportunity settle in Ariel, Maaleh Adumim, or Gush Etzion goes against the precepts of the road map, because we are not going to build new settlements for them."

Sharon's connection between the potential Gaza evacuation and the fence, say political analysts, is well orchestrated. "Sharon is softening the blow of Gaza by promising to grow in the West Bank," says Asher Cohen, a professor of political studies at Bar-Ilan University. "He has to do something that will make people believe, it's the price we'll pay, but we'll gain in other places."

The moving of Gaza settlers, if it happens, will be an expensive undertaking. Shoval, a former ambassador to the US, denied reports that suggested Israel is asking Washington for help. But the Yedioth Ahonoth newspaper reports that it could cost between $220,000 and $320,00 to compensate each family for leaving their home - and approximately 1,700 households would need to be resettled. The evacuation of factories, businesses, and hothouses, the paper said, could cost up to nearly half a billion dollars.

The Bakshys are not interested in even discussing compensation packages. Their strategy consists of prayer, planning demonstrations against Sharon - and more planting. Mrs. Bakshy plucks a kumquat from the thin tree and notes that it's a perfect fruit to celebrate Tu B'Shvat, a minor Jewish holiday that celebrates new fruits and has taken on an added importance this year.

Although polls show that a majority of Israelis will back Sharon's plan, she doesn't want to believe that she, too, might be plucked from this place. "If we can't bear to transfer Palestinians off their land," she says, "how can we do it to ourselves?"

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