ISRAEL FACES PROSPECT OF MASSIVE UNRESTJERUSALEM [MENL] -- Israel faces the prospect of massive resistance to the government's plan to expel about 10,000 Jews from the Gaza Strip and northern West Bank in 2005.
Leaders of the estimated 250,000 Jews in the West Bank and Gaza Strip have called for a campaign of civil disobedience to resist the evacuation of the areas. The Council of Jewish Communities in Judea, Samaria and Gaza, citing U.S. civil rights leader Martin Luther King and India's Mahatma Ghandi, has urged Israelis to risk imprisonment rather than cooperate with Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's plan for a military withdrawal from and expulsion of Israeli residents of the Gaza Strip and northern West Bank.
Officials said the campaign against Sharon's expulsion plan could harm Israel's strategic interests. They said among the non-lethal options that could be taken by withdrawal opponents include the refusal by tens of thousands of reservists to serve in the army, resignation by combatants of elite forces, sabotage of military facilities in the West Bank and Gaza Strip and the intimidation of government employees responsible for the withdrawal plan.
"The year 2005 is not likely to be an easy year for the people of Israel," Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom said. "It is likely to create rifts. The biggest challenge is to maintain unity of the people. There is no room for a split. Every Israeli citizen must preserve the rules of democracy."