THE MIDDLE EAST: Israel's Prime Minister, Mr Ariel Sharon, announced yesterday that he plans to bring a revised version of his plan to withdraw from the Gaza Strip to his cabinet on Sunday, even though he is not yet assured of a majority among his ministers.
"I intend to present my disengagement plan to the cabinet in a week and get it approved," the prime minister said.
Mr Sharon's original plan to disengage from the Palestinians was defeated earlier this month in a referendum in his ruling Likud party.
But in recent days he has been meeting with Likud ministers in a bid to win their support for a new version that also includes the evacuation of all settlements in Gaza and four in the West Bank. Unlike the original plan, however, the new one will be carried out in stages rather than in a single move. Each stage may also require cabinet approval.
The Israeli leader is hoping that the amendments will mollify hardliners in his party, but he could face a rebellion within the Likud if the new plan is viewed as a bid to circumvent the referendum. The far-right flank of Mr Sharon's government could also bolt if the plan passes.
"You know that when I fight for something correct and just, I carry it out," Mr Sharon said at a public event.
At yesterday's cabinet meeting, justice minister Mr Tommy Lapid - a Holocaust survivor - sparked an uproar when he called the policy of home demolitions in Gaza inhumane, and said television pictures of an elderly Palestinian woman rummaging through the remains of her bulldozed home in the Rafah refugee camp reminded him of his grandmother.
"The demolition of houses in Rafah must stop. It is not humane, not Jewish, and causes us grave damage in the world," he said.
Over 40 Palestinians have been killed, dozens of homes have been destroyed and thousands of residents have fled their homes in the course of the operation, the biggest in Gaza since the start of the intifada uprising. The army says it is aimed at preventing the smuggling of weapons from Egypt, via underground tunnels, into the Strip.
But it was Mr Lapid's remark about his grandmother that touched a nerve among his cabinet colleagues, who immediately assumed he was comparing the Rafah operation to the Holocaust. The justice minister replied that he had not compared "Israel to Germany or the Nazis. What I said is that there is no atonement for the suffering caused to a helpless, elderly woman."
Three members of the radical Hamas group were killed yesterday in the West Bank city of Nablus while handling explosives, Palestinian officials said.