Israel to shorten evacuation timetable to hamper resistance

Israeli Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz has ordered a drastic cut in the the timetable for withdrawing from the Gaza Strip and the northern West Bank this summer in an effort to hinder Jewish extremists bent on disrupting the pullout.

Military officials were worried that opponents of the withdrawal might use to force to resist evacuation.

Mofaz told defence officials that the planned eight-week evacuation would give the plan’s opponents too much time to disrupt it and to recruit reinforcements.

The government originally planned a 12-week pullout, but shortened it to eight weeks recently. In response to Mofaz’s orders, the timetable could now be cut to four weeks, officials said.

Thousands of religious Jews gathered in Jerusalem last night to protest at the withdrawal, comparing the evacuation of 9,000 settlers to the Holocaust, where six million Jews were killed.

Opposition to the pullout has grown more strident in recent weeks, with some opponents sending threatening letters to government leaders, blocking major Israeli roads with burning tyres and calling Israeli security forces Nazis.

Participants at the last night’s rally held balloons inscribed, “in each settlement there are more arms, ammunition and weapons-trained men than there were in the Warsaw ghetto,” implying that settlers should emulate Jews who rose up against the Nazis during the Second World War.