Enlarge imageBy Megan Goldin
JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Ariel Sharon’s deputy says the Israeli prime minister will push through his Gaza pullout plan virtually unchanged, even as work was set to begin today on a new fence deep in the territory to secure a settler road.
Indicating the barrier was a temporary measure until Israel withdrew from the Gaza Strip, Vice Premier Ehud Olmert predicted in a newspaper interview that Sharon would win cabinet approval within weeks despite his party’s rejection of the plan.
"We will implement the ’disengagement plan’,’ Olmert told the Jerusalem Post’s Thursday edition. "The prime minister must now create a mechanism that will allow him to pass this resolution, and that he will do."
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Military officials said a four-mile fence would be erected on a settlers-only road leading to Gaza’s Gush Katif Jewish settlement bloc after a woman settler and her four daughters were killed in an ambush there by Palestinian militants on Sunday.
Israel has drawn international condemnation for construction of a barrier that slices into the West Bank and is expected to extend more than 370 miles. Israel says it is a bulwark against suicide bombers. Palestinians call it a land grab.
Sunday’s attack contributed to the resounding defeat of Sharon’s "disengagement" plan in a referendum by his right-wing Likud party later that day.
But Sharon has said his defeat in his own party did not mean the initiative was being shelved. Aides said the prime minister and his aides were discussing how to refloat it.
Olmert dismissed media reports that Sharon would slim down the pullout plan, limiting it to a handful of isolated settlements in Gaza. He said a scaled-back pullout was impractical and would not meet with approval from Washington, Israel’s closest ally.
"It’s a non-starter," Olmert said.
SHARON TO SEEK U.S. HELP TO SALVAGE PLAN
Sharon’s original plan envisaged scrapping all 21 Gaza enclaves, with 7,500 Jews amidst 1.2 million Palestinians, and four of 120 in the West Bank. He has made clear he wants to retain several larger West Bank settlement blocs.
The initiative has angered Palestinians who hope to set up a state on all the West Bank and Gaza Strip, lands captured by Israel in the 1967 Middle East war.
Sharon plans to consult U.S. officials, probably including President George W. Bush, during a visit to the United States later this month to address the influential pro-Israel lobby group AIPAC, aides said.
Bush also signalled a Gaza withdrawal was still on the table, telling the U.S.-funded Arabic television station Alhurra that Sharon’s "own party condemned it but that doesn’t mean that it condemned the policy".
Tension resurged on Israel’s northern border as soldiers thwarted an attempted attack by Hizbollah guerrillas against a military position, Israel Radio said. The army was unable to provide immediate details on the incident.
The attempted cross-border attack followed an Israeli air strike on Hizbollah artillery positions on Wednesday after guerrillas fired anti-aircraft shells at a collective farm and beach in northern Israel. No one was hurt in either attack.
In West Bank violence, soldiers killed a Palestinian who tried to steal an automatic rifle in Hebron and forces arrested a senior Hamas leader near Tulkarm, Palestinian sources said.
