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| Israel-Palestine | |
| Israel plans triple-fencing of Gaza after pullout | |
| 2005-07-28 | |
URIM, Israel, July 28 (Reuters) - Israel is rushing to complete a three-layer-deep barrier of fences and walls on its border with Gaza to keep out Palestinian infiltrators after it pulls out of the territory, military officials said on Thursday. The army insists that, unlike Israel's internationally condemned West Bank barrier, the new project will not cut into Palestinian land. But it still could fuel Palestinian fears that Gaza will be left largely sealed after the Israeli pullout.
"Our purpose is to protect our citizens and soldiers. We have seen ... that we need something other than the existing fence to have full security," the senior official told reporters during a tour of construction sites for the barrier. He said, however, that even the triple fencing of Gaza might not be enough to stop militant attacks, and the army might have to mount incursions back into Gaza after the pullout. Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has billed the withdrawal as "disengagement" from conflict with the Palestinians. Palestinian officials were not immediately available for comment. Echoing Palestinian concerns, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said last week the United States wanted to make sure Israel did not keep Gaza sealed after its withdrawal. The military official said Israel had learned lessons from its Lebanon withdrawal in 2000, when it left a single fence line on its northern border where the army has since clashed regularly with Lebanese Hizbollah guerrillas. The army is putting up two new fences that will extend about 60 km (37 miles) along its entire border with Gaza, he said. One, made of metal and razor wire, is being installed a few dozen metres (yards) closer to the Gaza boundary line than the existing electronic fence, the official said. The other, embedded with sensors and equipped with surveillance cameras, watchtowers and remote-control machinegun emplacements, will lie 70 to 150 metres east of the existing border fence on the Israeli side, he said. A one-km (half-mile)-long wall will be erected on Israel's border with northern Gaza and walls extending several hundred metres will be in two places where Israeli towns are vulnerable to Palestinian gunfire, the official said. Israel has said it will keep control of Gaza's air and sea space after the pullout for security reasons, although troops are expected to leave the boundary with Egypt. Palestinians welcome any withdrawal but fear Israel is trading tiny Gaza, where 8,500 settlers live isolated from 1.4 million Palestinians, for a tighter hold on the occupied West Bank, where the majority of 240,000 settlers live. The World Court has declared Israel's West Bank barrier illegal for intruding on occupied land. Israel says the planned 600-km (370-mile)-long structure keeps out suicide bombers. Palestinians call it a grab for land they claim for a state. "The new fence is in our own territory," the senior official said of the Gaza barrier. He said the fencing would be finished by October and all of the infrastructure by mid-2006. | |
| Posted by:Steve |
| #1 No problem: |
| Posted by: Steve McQueen 2005-07-28 14:09 |