Giving Up Gaza

GAN OR, GAZA - Soon to be evacuated and later demolished, the house of Shimon and Sara Snir now sits in shambles.

The painting of a wizened rabbi rests on the salon floor amid a maze of Israeli army-issued boxes brimming with toys and puzzles. A power screwdriver whirs as bed frames are undone. Outside, a ditch has been dug around an olive tree that will be uprooted.

Thirteen years ago the couple followed faith and a dream to Gaza, which they believed to be part of the biblical birthright of the Jewish state. Now, like many of the 8,500 Jewish settlers bracing for Israel's withdrawal from Gaza next week, their family of nine has reluctantly begun to gather up their belongings. The moving truck arrives Sunday.

"You can't leave anything. If you don't take it, [the army] will destroy it," says Shimon Snir, while supervising a Palestinian worker taking apart a gazebo. "There's so much to pack we don't even know where to start."

On Monday they will get their eviction notices and Israel's long-anticipated evacuation of 25 settlements in Gaza and the northern West Bank -- a landmark pullback from territory conquered in 1967 and claimed by the Palestinians as part of a future state — will officially swing into motion.

Jewish settlers who haven't already left will then get a two-day grace period to depart. Teams of soldiers and policeman are poised to drag out stalwarts who defy the Aug. 17 deadline, a mission that many worry could spiral into violence and even bloodshed over the course of an evacuation that could last more than a month, according to the army.

But even though 55,000 security forces will take part in the evacuation, Shimon clings to hope that somehow the soldiers will be unable to extract the residents and some 2,000 sympathizers who have infiltrated the settlements over the past few weeks. So, he, his wife Sara, and seven children ranging in ages from 17 years to 18 months will await the soldiers in an empty house stockpiled with water, flour, and flashlights.

The family, which is eligible for $500,000 in compensation, will be fined more than $100,000 if they stay past the 17th, but, they say, money is little solace when you're forced out of home and community.

"Here is where your life is. You build it from start to finish," says Shimon, his skin a rich bronze from years under the Gaza sun. "We won't go like they want us to. They will have to carry us. You have to understand, a person doesn't abandon his house willingly."

The pull of Gaza

As a young couple the Snirs first fell in love with Gaza in the mid-1980s when it was mostly a collection of red-roofed houses in the middle of the sand. There was peace and quiet, and few people. But instead of settling down, they headed to Los Angeles for a taste of life in America.

Returning home six years later, the pull of Gaza remained strong and they moved with their two US-born children to Gaza. Instead of giving them pause, the outbreak of the first Palestinian uprising in 1987 only whetted their appetites to live in Gaza and help claim the disputed territory for Israel.

The Snirs believed Israel had come to Gush Katif to stay. They invested themselves in the settlement block's burgeoning agricultural business -- growing organic cherry tomatoes for export and then pineapples -- and an intimate community of farmers who shared their ideology.

Over a decade, the agricultural land owned by the family increased ninefold to 6.5 acres, bringing in income of $330,000 last year. Now Shimon will have to relocate elsewhere inside Israel, losing out on at least three growing seasons, he says.

Farmers like the Snirs are eligible for compensation for the greenhouses from the Israeli government and the World Bank, as well as free land elsewhere. But, Shimon says, that won't cover their losses.