Ariel Natan Pasko, February 18, 2004

The transports came roaring up the road, kicking up dust as they rocked from side to side. The Jews had been baking all morning, waiting out in the scorching June sun. They were rounded up early by the soldiers and told to line up in an orderly fashion. But how long could that last? Babies were crying, and little children were running this way and that, playing, while frightened mothers kept one eye on their kids and another on the soldiers guarding them.

The trucks pulled up to the crowd and stopped. Several soldiers got out and walked over to the huddled, frightened group of mothers and children. The soldiers barked orders to all the children, to get back in line by their mothers. The crying grew louder. The commanding officer walked over to the group and ordered them to take out their ID cards.

"This is the last check before leaving," he said. "We wouldn't want to leave anybody behind..."

Somewhere in Europe in 1944? No, this is Gaza, in 2005...

Ever since Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon annunciated his policy of turning Gaza into a "Judenrein Zone," they knew it was coming to this. Most of the people had left much earlier. The men were either taken off to jail, or had left for work or shopping and then not let back into their towns. Most of the women left peacefully after their men-folk were expelled, but some hardcores stayed.

This was the last group of Jews in Gaza, and Commander X - all the soldiers involved in the expulsions covered their faces and were called X - due to threats of reprisals. Not from the "settlers" I might add, but from their supporters throughout the land.

The Rabbis had already called on soldiers not to participate in these evil deeds. Hundreds of religious soldiers - those first called into action - were already languishing away in military prisons. The Army wanted to ferret out those most likely to disobey, so they at first, sent in only religious soldiers. They told the soldiers and "settlers" that this way they have nothing to fear. No beatings, no violence; they would be taken out by their own kind. But when the soldiers refused to carry out the "operation," they were hauled off to prison and replaced by club wielding anti-religious secularists, multi-generational leftists, and their Arab helpmates.

It didn't take long - only a few weeks - to empty most of the towns, after they had turned the water and electricity off, blockaded those left inside, stopped the food shipments and bus service, and started dropping teargas and sleeping gas on them.

But these were the hardcores; settler women driven with messianic zeal, and ferocious motherly love for their young, frightened by the prospects of the future unknown. Huddled together and cowered, they didn't look so threatening when Commander X was barking orders at them, now.

PM Sharon was keeping his promise to the nation, and to the Americans. He said he wouldn't let sentimentalism get in the way of the Roadmap and he kept his word. He proclaimed early on, that "painful concessions" would be necessary to keep the agreement with the Palestinians, and moving Jews out of parts of their historic homeland would happen. Yasser Arafat was probably rolling in his grave with joy.

Sharon was a man of his word, and even when Hamas started rocket attacks on his farm in the Negev, near Gaza, Sharon didn't veer from his plan. He earned every kilo of his nickname, "The Bulldozer". He bulldozed the very towns and cities that once in his youth he helped to plan-out and build. "We all must make sacrifices," he would remind the nation, even as he sifted through the rubble of his ranch house. "I intend to bring security and peace to this troubled land," he would bellow, always thinking, always planning.

Sharon was the true father of the settlements, and he was the true father of the "peace" that would come, with their destruction...

To forestall the above nightmare from coming true, several hundred rabbis convened in Jerusalem recently, to denounce Prime Minister Sharon's proposal to remove settlements from Gaza as part of a "disengagement" plan. The emergency conference drew rabbis from Judea and Samaria - the West Bank - and Gaza, as well as rabbis from around Israel, under the banner "Rabbis for the Unity of the Land of Israel."

Led by former Chief Rabbis Mordechai Eliyahu and Avraham Shapira, the rabbis announced that they were against the uprooting of Jewish communities from any part of the Land of Israel. The rabbis declared that, "Nobody, from wood choppers and water drawers to ministers and the prime minister" has any right to promote "this destructive plan and it is forbidden to participate or cooperate with it in any way."

Former Chief Rabbi Avraham Shapira warned that Sharon would find himself out of office if he tries to carry out his proposals. "Experience has proven that, heaven forbid, whoever harms the Land of Israel, whoever thinks such thoughts, loses his place and loses his position of power," Shapira said.

The rabbis called on right-wing parties to quit the government, if it becomes obvious Sharon intends to carry out his unilateral withdrawal plan and remove the Jews from Gaza. They added that Jews faithful to the Torah and People of Israel have no alterative but to leave such a government coalition. The rabbis vowed to block evacuation attempts by conducting Torah studies at the towns to be removed.

"If we do our part - bringing together the people of Israel - G-D will do his part," said former Chief Rabbi Mordechai Eliyahu.

Addressing the gathering, Rabbi David HaCohen of Bat Yam, compared Sharon's withdrawal plan to the infamous 1938 Munich "appeasement" agreement, in which Britain agreed to German control over Czechoslovakia in hopes of preventing a world war, which led to catastrophe.

"The sin and crime of dismantling and destroying Jewish communities, is a crime against the Jewish people of all generations, and it cannot be excused or forgiven," HaCohen said. "It is very dangerous and imperils the nation no less than the Munich Agreement that was made with the Nazis, may their name be blotted out."

Let's hope history doesn't repeat itself.

Ariel Natan Pasko is an independent analyst & consultant. He has a Master's Degree in International Relations & Policy Analysis. His articles appear regularly on numerous news/views and think-tank websites, in newspapers, and can be read at: www.geocities.com/ariel_natan_pasko

Copyright © 2004 Ariel Natan Pasko