Gaza Farmers Say Government Has No Plan for Them
By: Administrative Account | Source: CNSNews.com
April 11, 2005 6:47AM EST

By Julie Stahl
CNSNews.com Jerusalem Bureau Chief
April 11, 2005

Gush Katif, Gaza (CNSNews.com) - Shlomo Wasserteil, a successful Israeli farmer, employs up to 45 workers in the busy season -- many of them Palestinians.

But three months from now he may need government assistance to support his own family because he says there is no way for him to move his business out of the Gaza Strip.

All 21 Jewish communities in the Gaza Strip and four in the northern West Bank will be evacuated this summer under Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's unilateral disengagement plan, which is intended to reduce contact and friction between Israelis and Palestinians.

The government has promised compensation to residents and business owners, many of whom have lived in the settlements for nearly 30 years.

A government compensation committee met for the first time this week, beginning the process of deciding how much each family will get.

Most Israelis in the Gaza Strip are hoping the plan won't be implemented. But if worst comes to worst, farmers say there is no procedure in place to help them move their farming businesses.

Agriculture is the economic foundation of the 18 Jewish communities in the southern Gaza Strip. There are some 4,000 dunams (1,000 acres) of high-tech greenhouses in the southern settlement area known as Gush Katif.

About $120 million worth of flowers and produce are exported from Gush Katif each year.

Sixty-five percent of organic vegetables and 60 percent of the herbs exported from Israel come from Gush Katif, said Yossi Tsarfati, manager of the agriculture industry in the Gush Katif.

"It's a big mental struggle. Everyone wants to stay here," said Tsarfati. "But the reality is if we need to leave here...it puts [the farmers] in a deep pit."

Moving the businesses would break the link between the farmers on one end -- and exporters and importers on the other end, he said. "There are very hard dilemmas...[But] there is no hurry to get to the next place. There is no next place."

It could take years to prepare the infrastructure, water pipes and electricity for the hot-houses, he said.

For six months, the Israeli government has been searching unsuccessfully for another place with the right climate and soil conditions to plant herbs -- one of the main crops.

But even if a suitable place could be found, it would take at least two years to produce a crop and the crop size would be less than what is being produced now, said Tsarfati, a longtime resident of Gush Katif.

Standing in one of his two very large greenhouses, Wasserteil said what really bothers him is that Israeli Knesset members voted in favor of the disengagement compensation law without understanding the situation.

"They don't know what they're talking about -- everybody that comes here says it can't be. This is the reality," Wasserteil said.

Wasserteil has 35 dunams (almost nine acres) of hot houses containing about one million plants, he said. "I've been here almost 30 years. I built this with my own money."

Row after row of brightly colored geraniums lined one hot house. Cuttings from these plants are rooted in plastic containers on tables fitted with special computerized heating coils and then shipped off to Europe, Wasserteil said.

About 60 percent of the geraniums exported by Israel each year to Europe come from this Gush Katif settlement of Ganei Tal, where some 65 families live.

Various other plants are packed in plastic boxes to be trucked off to the local market.

But when it comes to compensation, the law is complicated, he said. Although his equipment works fine, some of it is deemed too old for compensation, Wasserteil said.

When he asked who would pay for his plants, he was told that he could take them with him. It would take 100 double trailer trucks to haul all of his plants, and where would he even take them, he asked.

An official for SELA, the government office created to handle compensation claims for the disengagement, said SELA is trying to give assistance to the farmers but it's not an easy situation and they can help only if the farmers contact them.

"There are special problems," said the official, who asked not to be named, when asked about where this particular farmer could put his plants. "The solutions are very complicated...We have experts to assist them."

The official said that SELA believes about 150 farmers want to continue in agriculture. Some had contacted the office but he declined to say how many.

But Wasserteil said it won't be just the 400 farmers in Gush Katif who will suffer if their businesses are uprooted from the Gaza Strip. "It's a true tragedy for the people of Israel," he said.

He estimated that some 10,000 people are employed in agriculture and related industries in Gush Katif. That includes the 5,000 Palestinians who work in Gush Katif -- jobs that support tens of thousands of their relatives.

Wassertiel himself employs foreign workers from Thailand as well as Palestinians. "We pay everyone. The problem is, in three months maybe I'll need support," he said.

Beyond the economic concerns are those of security, he said. The army is already worried about the possibility of rocket attacks on Israel and tunnels being dug under the border when the army pulls out of Gaza, he said.

In his office, Wasserteil has a collection of twisted pieces of metal and metal tubes -- remnants of mortar shells that Palestinian terrorists have fired at Gush Katif over the last four and half years.

Twelve mortar shells (out of an estimated 5,300) fell on Wasserteil's property alone, including one that killed a Thai worker in December. Her death prompted the Thai government to order its citizens to go home. Some arrived back in Thailand just before the December 26 tsunami struck the country.

"There are those who say there is no life after Gush Katif," Wassertiel said. "They won't shoot at soldiers [but] it can't be that a person has to go around searching for bread," he said.

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