Jewish settlers have vowed to take their protests to the streets to block Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's plan to remove them from Gaza, as the project was about to clear its last hurdle in parliament.
A deal with opposition lawmakers was expected to see the national budget passed later in the day, smoothing the way for Mr Sharon to push ahead with Israel's first dismantling of settlements on occupied land Palestinians want for a state.
Gaza settler Arieh Yitzhaki, speaking on Israel Radio
Frustrated in efforts to torpedo Mr Sharon's Disengagement Plan, settler leaders have raised the spectre of civil war but have urged their followers to resist without violence.
Officials have given settlers until the last week of July to accept compensation and leave voluntarily or face eviction. But settler leaders have pledged to send hundreds of thousands of protesters into the territories slated for evacuation and which many say is theirs by biblical birthright. The army intends to seal off the areas ahead of the pullout.
"We will block the disengagement with our bodies," Gaza settler Arieh Yitzhaki told Israel Radio.
The settlement plan calls for evacuation of 8,500 Israelis living in 21 Jewish settlements in the Gaza Strip and four out of 120 settlements in the northern West Bank. Mr Sharon views the settlements in those areas as liabilities in terms of cost and security. But he has made clear that Israel will now tighten its hold on large swathes of West Bank land where the vast majority of its 240,000 settlers live.
Many Palestinians are wary of Mr Sharon's plan. They want all of the West Bank and Gaza for a state.
Mr Sharon won a key victory yesterday when parliament rejected holding a pullout referendum, a proposal he had branded a delaying tactic by opponents of a plan most Israelis support.
Mr Sharon, once considered the godfather of the settlers' cause but now reviled by them as a traitor, was expected to overcome the last legislative obstacle with approval of the 2005 budget.
Failure to pass the package by March 31st would trigger a snap election, delaying the withdrawal from Gaza or possibly shelving it altogether.
Despite a rightist mutiny in his own Likud party, Mr Sharon assured passage of the budget by striking a deal with the centrist opposition party Shinui. Its 15 votes will give Mr Sharon up to 68 votes in the 120-seat Knesset.