Gaza withdrawal behind schedule?

jerusalem | About half of Jewish settlers to be uprooted from the Gaza Strip and northern West Bank this summer are in talks with the government about moving, defying calls by their leaders to oppose the plan, officials said this week.

But with only 10 percent of the settlers having taken the public step of tapping the government's evacuation compensation fund, officials cautioned against waiting too long. And Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, dismissing charges that the government wasn't ready for the mid-August pullout, attacked opponents who are pressuring settlers to resist, and vowed to carry it out on time.

At a ministerial meeting on the pullout, officials said more than 900 families are in various stages of negotiation with the government.

But Yonatan Bassi, the head of the government agency overseeing civilian aspects of the withdrawal, cautioned that time is short.

He told the committee that just 199 families and businesses have submitted requests for a piece of the $930 million the government has earmarked to compensate settlers.

These include just 87 families and 16 businesses from the Gaza Strip, where the overwhelming majority of the 1,800 settler families live, he said.

The low numbers attest to "the intense pressure being applied in Gush Katif not to submit compensation requests," Bassi said.