EXPANDED ISRAEL MEDIA REACTION

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 07 TEL AVIV 005034

SIPDIS

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E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: IS KMDR MEDIA REACTION REPORT
SUBJECT: EXPANDED ISRAEL MEDIA REACTION


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SUBJECTS COVERED IN THIS REPORT:
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Gaza and Northern West Bank Disengagement

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Key stories in the media:
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Ha'aretz's web site reported that the U.S. sees Gaza as
a starting point in the peace process, but quoted a
State Department official as saying it was clear little
may get done in the months after the pullout. The
unnamed official quoted as saying, "Our plan is to urge
both sides to get back to dialogue but we have to see
how this goes. You can't script this too much."
Hatzofe (Haggai Huberman) reported that Secretary of
State Condoleezza Rice might visit Israel shortly to
follow up on the implementation of the pullout from the
Gaza Strip. The newspaper cited GOI assessments that,
further to providing support to Sharon during the
disengagement, the visit's objective will be to ensure
that there will be no diplomatic freeze after it.

Last night at midnight, the electronic media reported
live on the permanent closure of the Gaza Strip to
Israelis, which marked the start of the disengagement
(leading stories in all media). Israel Radio reported
that several hundred young people, many of them non-
residents, created disturbances in Gush Katif, and that
nine protesters were arrested in the northern West
Bank. Ha'aretz reported that, despite expectations,
most Gush Katif residents are still there. However,
Jerusalem Post and other media note that 280 of the 290
families of Nissanit, the Strip's second largest
settlement, have moved out, and that all the residents
of Dugit (also in the northern Strip) will leave today.
Jerusalem Post reported that the IDF is ready to
evacuate the northern West Bank settlements of Ganim
and Kadim from Wednesday if the cabinet approves such a
move. The radio also reported that many settlers are
refusing to accept from the army evacuation letters,
which state that the operation will be conducted by
force starting Wednesday. Israel Radio and IDF Radio
reported that this morning the cabinet voted in favor
of the evacuation of Gush Katif, the largest settlement
bloc in the Gaza Strip, further Gaza Strip settlements.
The vote was 16 in favor and four against. Labor
ministers backed the measure. The dissenting votes
were cast by Likud ministers Limor Livnat, Tzachi
Hanegbi, Yisrael Katz and Danny Naveh.

Leading media reported that PM Sharon will deliver a
speech to the nation in which he will supposedly
empathize with, but not apologize, to, the settlers.

PA Chairman [President] Mahmoud Abbas was quoted as
saying in an interview broadcast last night on Channel
10-TV that Israel is advancing in the right direction
but that Israelis should not forget that the pullout
from Gaza is only the beginning. Abbas also said that
Israelis would be welcomed in Gaza as tourists.
Jerusalem Post quoted PA security officials as saying
that some 15,000 Palestinian policemen have been
recruited for the purpose of preventing armed groups
from disrupting the Israeli pullout. Israel Radio
reported that 4,000 Palestinian policemen have already
been deployed around the settlements. On Sunday,
Jerusalem Post quoted senior PA officials as saying
that the PA is planning to move thousands of PLO
fighters from Lebanon to the Gaza Strip after the
disengagement. Israel Radio quoted Hamas leader in
Gaza Mahmoud Zahar as saying in the Egyptian daily Al-
Ahram that his movement will transfer its activity to
the West Bank and eventually to Jerusalem.

Israel Radio quoted Palestinian sources as saying that
a meeting held last night between Defense Minister
Shaul Mofaz and PA Interior Minister Nasser Yousef was
fruitless. The station reported that sources in
Yousef's bureau blamed the Israeli representatives for
the failure of the talks, citing "their negative
attitude regarding military coordination of the
disengagement

Israel Radio reported that mortar shells were fired at
southern Gush Katif last night, causing no damage.

Southern Command O/C Maj. Gen. Dan Harel was quoted as
saying in an interview with Ha'aretz that he would not
have volunteered to implement the settlers' evacuation,
and that "the IDF was chosen to be the execution
instrument of the tragedy."

On Sunday, Ha'aretz reported that Palestinian laborers
will not be compensated for the loss of their jobs in
the Gaza settlements' hothouses.

Yediot reported on "bad news for high-tech workers":
the USG announced during the weekend that the allotment
of H1B visas for 2006 has been exhausted. The
newspaper notes that 800-1,000 Israeli engineers obtain
work annually in the U.S. through this type of visa.

Citing the Israeli press agency Itim, Hatzofe reported
on a claim by convicted spy Jonathan Pollard, in a
petition to the High Court of Justice, that Shimon
Peres, who served as PM at the time of his arrest,
returned the documents Pollard had seized to then-
Secretary of State George Shultz, thus paving the way

SIPDIS
for his conviction.

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Gaza and Northern West Bank Disengagement:
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Summary:
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Senior columnist Nahum Barnea wrote on page one of mass-
circulation, pluralist Yediot Aharonot: "When Yitzhak
Rabin said he'd prefer to see Gaza drown in the sea, he
was expressing, crudely, what many Israelis felt."

Senior columnist and longtime dove Yoel Marcus wrote on
page one of independent, left-leaning Ha'aretz: "In
Sharon's speech to the nation this evening, he won't
apologize to the settlers. They have already exhausted
their right to protest, and now they are damaging the
authority of the state, its strength and its democratic
regime."

Editor-in-Chief Amnon Dankner wrote in popular,
pluralist Maariv: "This week will spin Israeli society
and many of its components ... between despair and
hope, the latter against the background of the
consoling words of praise of the President of the
United States and on the other hand the Palestinian
celebrations full of haughtiness. Until now it has
succeeded in not falling apart."

Prominent liberal author David Grossman wrote in
Ha'aretz: "We should all take a deep breath right now
and remind ourselves that, in the final analysis, the
days to come are days of mourning for all Israelis."

Conservative columnist Nadav Haetzni wrote in Maariv:
"Real disengagement from the Palestinians won't take
place, but emergent disengagement among the various
components of Israeli society will definitely be
achieved."

Nationalist, Orthodox Hatzofe editorialized: "[Likud
politicians and allies] can still bring down the
immoral foundation of Sharon's leadership and
government."

Editor-in-Chief Bassam Jaber wrote in left-leaning,
Arabic-language weekly Panorama: " We ... believe that
the withdrawal plan is one step on the way to a
complete withdrawal from the Palestinian territories."

Block Quotes:
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I. "Gaza First"

Senior columnist Nahum Barnea wrote on page one of mass-
circulation, pluralist Yediot Aharonot (August 15): "It
is going to be hot, humid and sticky this morning at
the entrance to Kissufim road, and closed. The barrier
has been shut on 38 years of occupation in the Gaza
Strip and on 29 years of settlement.... The occupation
of the Gaza Strip brought very little pleasure to
either the occupiers or the occupied. When Yitzhak
Rabin said he'd prefer to see Gaza drown in the sea, he
was expressing, crudely, what many Israelis felt. Gaza
was, as one person once wrote, Israel's armpit: poor,
densely populated, fanatical, violent and polluted, the
pool from which Israel drew a generation of menial
laborers.... With the disengagement plan Sharon is
trying, in his own way, to live out Rabin's fantasy: if
we can't drown Gaza in the sea, at least we can turn
our backs on it. To feel as if we are free of it....
After the settlers' tears have dried, after the media
dust has settled, what will be left imprinted on
everyone's mind will be that for the first time
settlements were removed from what is considered to be
the Land of Israel. This step is tremendously
significant, both socially and politically. The
settlers have lost the veto power they once possessed
over the evacuation of settlements. Rabin, Peres and
Barak, three prime ministers who wanted to evacuate
settlements, were daunted by the immense power the
settlers wield. Sharon was braver than they: he dared
to put that legend to the test, and he did so
unilaterally.... It is no wonder that the religious
settlers are fighting disengagement with all their
might: they are fighting for their status, their
existence, their faith. They won't be able to raise
the barrier that was lowered last night at Kissufim
roadblock; they have their eye on the roadblocks yet to
come. In their view, the battle is over the Land of
Israel. In the view of the commanders of the police
and soldiers who will face them, it is a battle over
the authority of the state."

II. "The Dream Is Over"

Senior columnist and longtime dove Yoel Marcus wrote on
page one of independent, left-leaning Ha'aretz (August
15): "The goal [of disengagement] was to relocate
communities that we wouldn't keep anyway in any final
settlement. ... In his detailed narrative, [Sharon]
correctly predicted that the implementation would be
complicated -- both in a political and operational
sense -- and that a year and a half to two years would
be needed to complete it. He foresaw the political
difficulties he would encounter with the Likud
institutions. But what my ear discerned more than
anything was the statement: 'Don't see this evacuation
as the end of the process.' In other words, he had
reached a decision, by himself, about dividing the
land. This was Sharon's divorce from the settlers and
his farewell to the idea of Greater Israel. As he
said: 'We had a dream, but it cannot be
implemented'.... This morning 1,200 officers will give
the settlers their evacuation orders, with orders that
they must leave their homes within 48 hours. Starting
Wednesday, every Israeli, whether settler or
infiltrator, will be forcibly evacuated from the Gaza
Strip. The decision to evacuate passed in the cabinet,
the Knesset and the High Court of Justice. But the
Yesha Council settlers, the extremists, the hilltop
youth, the Kahanists and some of the rabbis have
declared a revolt against the authority of the state.
From rally to rally, from provocation to provocation,
from threat to threat, they determined to forcibly
thwart the evacuation by infiltrating in their
thousands into Gaza, with the IDF as the enemy.... In
Sharon's speech to the nation this evening, he won't
apologize to the settlers. They have already exhausted
their right to protest, and now they are damaging the
authority of the state, its strength and its democratic
regime. They dare not lift a finger against the army
or the police, lest they transform the continued
existence of the state into a dream."

III. "Country in Turmoil"

Editor-in-Chief Amnon Dankner wrote in popular,
pluralist Maariv (August 14): "This week will spin
Israeli society and many of its components into public
and private conflicts between emotion and thought,
between various perceptions of democracy, between
conflicting understandings of the boundaries of protest
and opposition, between despair and hope, the latter
against the background of the consoling words of praise
of the President of the United States and on the other
hand the Palestinian celebrations full of haughtiness.
Until now it has succeeded in not falling apart in the
force of the emotions that contradict the bonds that
keep it whole. The gloomy prophecies that prevailed
regarding such a violent disintegration have been
proven false, and now it remains to see whether there
will be enough insight to restrain the wild elements at
the fringes of the camp, to overcome the tearing pain,
to continue to show responsibility and to emerge whole
from this shake-up that in the past tore and ripped
apart societies and countries that appeared to be
strong and united."


IV. "Something to Mourn"

Prominent liberal author David Grossman wrote in
Ha'aretz (August 15): "We should all take a deep breath
right now and remind ourselves that, in the final
analysis, the days to come are days of mourning for all
Israelis. Mourning for the personal and ideological
pain of the settlers whose dreams have been shattered;
mourning for the fact that Israel was drawn into such a
dangerous and unrealistic adventure like the creation
of Gush Katif; mourning for the fact that the state
brought itself to the place where it was forced to do
such a violent, warlike and brutal thing to thousands
of its citizens; mourning for the abyss that is being
created inside our home, and for the disaster that
could befall us very soon; and mourning for the
situation in which we are trapped, Jew against Jew with
a foreign, naked hostility that stands in complete,
existential contradiction to our own interests.... At
the end of the day, the uprooting of the settlements
and the people is an act in which all Israeli citizens
have a role and responsibility, whatever their
beliefs."


V. "A Disaster Foretold"

Conservative columnist Nadav Haetzni wrote in Maariv
(August 15): "Whatever happens, there will be no
disengagement. The implementation of Sharon's plan
will booby-trap Israel: the more power is left in its
hands -- at border crossings, in the security
'envelope' -- we'll be perceived as responsible for
everything in the Gaza Strip. The more power we
relinquish, the more dangerous the freedom of action
granted to the terror state that will arise. This,
'disengagement' -- the false concept born of a prime
ministerial spin -- will assume its correct meaning.
Real disengagement from the Palestinians won't take
place, but emergent disengagement among the various
components of Israeli society will definitely be
achieved."

VI. "On the Eve of the Gate's Closing"

Nationalist, Orthodox Hatzofe editorialized (August
15): "Sharon can't respond to Qassam rocket fire
emanating from behind those settlements he wishes to
evacuate. The Western and Arab world won't allow him a
proper response that wouldn't take the civilian
Palestinian population into consideration. We have
already hear the voice of [Attorney General] Meni
Mazuz, who said that uncontrolled artillery fire
wouldn't be allowed and that it would be viewed as a
war crime. In conjunction with the United Torah
Judaism Knesset members, Likud ministers and Knesset
members can still bring down the immoral foundation of
Sharon's leadership and government.... This would save
Israel from a harsh catastrophe -- Heaven forbid --
should the deportation decree indeed be implemented."

VII. "Hopefully, Only the First Step"

Editor-in-Chief Bassam Jaber wrote in left-leaning,
Arabic-language weekly Panorama (August 12): "I'm
writing this article while only few hours separate us
from the withdrawal plan, which the Prime Minister
Sharon described as the most complicated and difficult
step facing Israel... We believe that the extreme
right's opposition reflects the fear of the settlers
and their supporters about the next steps.... We are
among those who believe that the withdrawal plan is one
step on the way to a complete withdrawal from the
Palestinian territories.... We believe that the
withdrawal from Gaza is for the benefit of both
Israelis and Palestinians, since no one really knows
what would have happened if no separation was made
between the two nations.... Our belief is that this
withdrawal is an initial step that will be followed by
many others, despite Sharon's statements that reflect
the opposite, which we believe are only his way to
reduce pressure on him from fanatic Rabbis who want to
keep Israel amidst ongoing clashes with the
Palestinians and the neighboring Arab countries."

KURTZER