Settlers accost Israeli army rabbi over Gaza graves

Jewish settlers threw scrunched-up garbage bags in the face of Israel's top army rabbi yeterday in protest at his visit to discuss removing graves during the planned Gaza Strip pullout.

"How can you kill a person twice?" one of the 40 demonstrators shouted at Brigadier-General Yisrael Weiss, chief military chaplain. The Orthodox rabbi did not reply. The black plastic bags were meant to symbolise burial shrouds.

Israeli authorities plan to dig up the remains of 48 Jews buried in a tiny hilltop graveyard in Gush Katif, the main settlement bloc in the occupied Gaza Strip, and transfer them to cemeteries in Israel.

The reburial, amid Israeli concerns that graves left behind might be desecrated, has become one of the most emotive issues surrounding the evacuation of all 21 Gaza settlements scheduled to begin in mid-August.

Rightists say the pullout betrays Jewish claims on biblical land and rewards a 4 1/2-year-old Palestinian armed uprising.

Yet polls show a narrow majority of Israelis support Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's plan to "disengage" from conflict by quitting Gaza and a corner of the West Bank. "Whoever is still opposed to it will fall silent once the last settlement has been cleared. A few scars may remain, but no open wounds," Israeli Vice Prime Minister Shimon Peres said in an interview with Germany's Sueddeutsche Zeitung newspaper.

At the settlement of Neve Dekalim, protesters threw the rolled-up black plastic bags at Mr Weiss and said digging up their dead violated Jewish religious law.

"This goes against the Torah (Jewish Bible)," said Chaya Tzion, 28. Settlers threw logs, rocks and garbage bins in the path of Mr Weiss's vehicle and scuffled with soldiers who tried to stop them.

Addressing a parliamentary committee in Jerusalem, Major-General Dan Harel, Israel's Gaza commander, said the military hopes the removal of all 8,500 Gaza settlers can be completed in three weeks.

The latest timeframe, including an additional week allocated for the evacuation of 500 settlers from four isolated West Bank settlements, was in line with previous estimates given by the Israeli military.