The debate rages over the summer departure from the Strip. Emad Gad surveys the facts Israel is currently witnessing a sharp debate over the disengagement plan, Ariel Sharon's plan to unilaterally withdraw from the Gaza Strip. Even as the prime minister reiterates that the plan will be implemented, forces on the Israeli right remain violently opposed -- including a bloc inside the Likud, Sharon's own party. These forces see the plan as a blatant violation of the principle of the greater land of Israel. Settler movements and organisations, supported by many rabbis, have mobilised to oppose the plan, even alluding at the possible use of force against those who come to evacuate the settlements. The opponents have made use of a religious discourse that accuses Sharon and all those who support the plan of disobeying Biblical injunctions by ceding part of the Biblical land of Israel. As a result, two weeks ago, Sharon postponed the plan to August 2005, rather than mid-July as previously scheduled, to mark the traditional Jewish days of mourning over the destruction of the Second Temple. In doing so, he hoped to prevent opponents to the plan from exploiting the religious occasion to further delegitimise the dismantling of settlements in the Gaza Strip and four settlements in the northern West Bank. The debate rages even though surveys of Israeli public opinion show majority support for the withdrawal. A poll conducted by Tzav Pius is a good example. Surveying a representative sample of 500 Jewish Israelis age 18 and over, the findings of the poll were published on 20 April in Yediot Aharonot online. The poll found that 55 per cent of respondents support the disengagement plan while 29 per cent oppose it. "A total of 81 per cent of supporters of the disengagement plan believe that the stance of opponents to the plan is legitimate, although they do not agree with or understand their stance," the article said. "In contrast, only 46 per cent of opponents to the disengagement plan believe that supporters have a legitimate position, despite the high percentage of them (95 per cent) who say publicly that the unity of the Jewish people is important or very important to them. In contrast, 88 per cent of supporters of the plan said that unity was important or very important to them. "Some 63 per cent of the Israeli public believes that there is a moderate to large chance that people will die during the disengagement in clashes between security forces and settlers. A large percentage of opponents to the plan (43 per cent) think there is a big chance that people will die in the clashes. "About half of the public thinks that disengagement will lead to strife among the people. The percentage of those who believe this is particularly high among opponents to the plan (71 per cent) compared to supporters (39 per cent). "About half of the Jewish public (47 per cent) is hopeful or very hopeful given the anticipated consequences of disengagement and what will follow. In contrast, 30-31 per cent of the public feels some or a great degree of fear and anger." In the midst of such polarisation and the possibility of fatal clashes during the implementation of the plan in early August, Haaretz devoted its editorial of 11 May, entitled "It's in our hands, and in our power", to reiterate the necessity of the withdrawal from Gaza and the need to apply the roadmap, the only path to a political settlement that will realise the interests of Israel and its people. The editorial maintains that the only way to realise peace is through negotiations and by implementing political agreements, which should start with the withdrawal from Gaza. "Fifty-six years ago," the editorial begins, "the War of Independence ended with the armistice agreements, thus achieving the goal we celebrate today on the 57th Independence Day: the establishment of an independent state for the Jewish nation in the Land of Israel. The success of the utopian Zionist enterprise was never guaranteed from the start, nor was it guaranteed in the first few years of statehood. But over the years, the state prospered, its population increased beyond expectations, and its military strength grew to enormous proportions. "Nonetheless, there are still those who believe that nothing significant happened in the chronicles of our people in 1948, and that nothing was finalised in that declaration of statehood and in that war. Those who have not yet grasped the meaning of the establishment of the state are still trying to stretch the border of this tiny, blood-soaked land for the sake of their camp -- some with arguments for the right of return, some with bulldozers, prayer shawls and weapons. "Permanent borders have never been set for the state, and the dispute over the borders continues. Even the Green Line was but a route that the Arabs tried to erode, and from which Israel tried to distance itself after the Six-Day War with a combination of a search for security and for redemption. "The absence of a border divides the public into two camps with two world views: 'Grab what you can,' and 'grab too much and you'll lose it all.' Facing off against the camp that wants to use force to settle among the Arabs and dispossess them is a camp that is ready to use force only to defend the existing state without dispossessing the neighbour. "This Independence Day there is nothing more optimistic and important to strive for than the repatriation of the Land of Israel, by agreement and not through war, into the state of Israel and the state of Palestine, and to do so with sense and goodwill, on the assumption that if our neighbours benefit, perhaps so will we. And this must be done without stinginess, without whining, without settling accounts, without seeing mountains in shadows of mountains, without sticking to each tel and grave and house, without fear of historic decisions, without giving up the basic Zionist aspiration to maintain a Jewish state of refuge that is democratic and tries to live in peace with its neighbours. "The disengagement from Gaza must be the first stage on the way to a logical partition of the country, an opportunity to create two independent entities, which through cooperation could bring prosperity while pettiness will lead to their destruction. Since Israel is more powerful and prosperous than its nascent neighbour, it can allow itself some calculated concessions; to give up the impulse to always appear the victor, to acquire more land, to contain the Palestinians in suffocating enclaves, tiny nooks in a fence between them and their farmlands, their families, and their sources of livelihood. A border of peace can exist only if it takes into account the interests of the neighbour; if not, it will lead to the next clash and bloodshed. "If the entire intent in the departure from Gaza is to temporarily calm things down, neutralise international pressure and buy time, while looking for new subterfuges with which to grab more land with the help of the flexible route of the separation fence; if every outpost in the West Bank turns into 'the rock of our existence;' if every further evacuation is perceived as a trauma and not as a building block for peace -- a historic opportunity, nearly the last opportunity to be a truly free nation, will have once again slipped out of our hands." To read more about the controversy over the disengagement plan, please visit the website of Arabs Against Discrimination www.aad-on-line.org.
