Around the outskirts of the Israeli village of Kfar Maimon, police vehicles and water cannons patrol.
Deployed nearby are thousands of police and security forces, ready to prevent the protesters inside the village from marching over the border into the Gaza Strip — closed since last week to non-resident Israelis — and on to the Israeli Gaza settlement of Gush Katif.
Tens of thousands of would-be marchers, angered at the settlement pull-out plan due to swing into action on August 17, spent the night in Kfar Maimon following the first showdown with the Israeli authorities on Monday.
The demonstrators are there ostensibly for a three-day protest to display their support for the settlers, although harsher calls have already been heard. Some slogans urge the marchers to ”ravage the army camps”.
Some of the protesters are very young; many wear orange-coloured clothing or carry orange banners and flags. The colour orange has become the symbol of the anti-pull-out movement.
Many protesters drape orange sheets about their shoulders as others would a flag of their nation. Among this group of angry Israelis, however, the official state Star of David flag is nowhere to be seen.
Yaakov Magnes, a 53-year-old school counsellor, travelled from the Golan Heights, dodging police roadblocks on Monday to make his way to Kfar Maimon.
A softly spoken man with a long, grey beard, Magnes came to Israel from the United States more than 20 years ago.
”When Jews are to be thrown out of their own homes, when somebody can’t live where they want in their own country … how can one stay silent?” he asks.
For Magnes, the Gaza pull-out marks a serious setback for Israel.
”It’s another step towards throwing us out of the country — this is what the Arabs think,” he claims.
The protesters, however, face not just opposition from the police and the government; their stand runs counter to public opinion across Israeli society.
Polls continue to show a majority of Israelis in favour of the pull-out from the Gaza Strip, where 8 000 settlers live among 1,4-million Palestinians, often in chronically overcrowded conditions.
Support for the pull-out, nonetheless, has fallen in recent weeks.
The stated aim of the anti-pull-out movement is to turn public opinion in its favour.
Part of this strategy involves increasing internal pressure on Prime Minister Ariel Sharon. Efforts have been made to recruit new members for Sharon’s Likud party from within the ranks of the protesters, a move to tip the balance of power within the party away from the premier.
Smadar Yecheskel and Miriam Vannikov, both 16, have come to Kfar Maimon with their synagogue’s youth group. Both have packed for a three-day trip. Both are clearly enjoying the escapade enormously.
”We think the Palestinians should just go to Jordan,” says one of the girls. ”I mean, that’s their country.”
Alternatively, they could just stay on ”Israeli” land, the teenagers muse. But in that scenario, ”Israeli Jews shouldn’t be able to restrict their rights”. — Sapa-DPA