MIDDLE EAST: Less than a week before Israel begins pulling all its settlers and troops out of the occupied Gaza Strip, Palestinians say they fear the area will become a large prison, cut off from the West Bank and the rest of the world. Nuala Haughey reports from Jerusalem
While Israeli and Palestinian officials have agreed some aspects of the withdrawal from the coastal enclave, key issues about the control of border crossings and the movement of goods and people have still not been resolved.
The two sides have been haggling over co-ordination issues for most of the year, after Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon altered his "unilateral" approach to the disengagement following the death of his arch-enemy, the Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, last November.
Palestinians warn that if Israel continues to control Gaza's borders, airspace and seacoast after the evacuation, it will merely repackage its occupation of the territory, which it seized along with the West Bank and Golan Heights in the 1967 Six-Day War.
"Israel has yet to provide answers and information on all of the major issues," said Diane Bhutto, adviser to the Palestinian technical team which is co-ordinating key aspects of the evacuation with the Israelis.
"Palestinians fear that the occupied Gaza Strip will be turned into a large prison, with no access to the occupied West Bank or the rest of the world. My biggest fear is that when they evacuate they will lock the door and throw away the key."
However, Israel rejects this suggestion, insisting that it must move gradually and protect itself against attacks by militants until the Palestinians prove they can build institutions and manage the often lawless enclave themselves.
"It's important to calibrate our steps and the principle is that we have as much opening as possible without doing too much and then having to close things down because of terrorism," said an Israeli foreign ministry spokesman, Mark Regev.
James Wolfensohn, the international envoy who has been trying to broker an agreement on economic aspects of the withdrawal, has said Gaza's severely depressed economy can only revive if goods and people can move freely through border crossings.
A key issue for Gazans is the Rafah crossing to Egypt in the south, its only direct link to the outside world.
The Palestinians want international inspectors to handle customs and security at Rafah, but the Israelis want to move the crossing three kilometres eastwards to a point where Gaza, Egypt and Israel converge, so they can retain control.
Israel is concerned about the flow of cheap goods into Israel via Gaza, as well as the smuggling of weapons from Egypt.
Israeli hardliners such as Benjamin Netanyahu, who resigned from the Israeli cabinet last Sunday in protest at the pullout, have warned that the current security climate means the Gaza Strip will become a terrorist camp, with rockets aimed at Israeli cities.
To date, Israel has agreed to the construction of a seaport in Gaza, which could take up to three years to build and is crucial if the Palestinians are to improve their economy and reduce their reliance upon Israeli ports.
But it has been much more cautious about allowing Palestinians to reopen their airport in Gaza, due to a reluctance to cede control of the Strip's airspace.
Freedom of movement is another key issue for Gaza's 1.2 million Palestinians, some 90 per cent of whom are currently not allowed by Israel to leave the tiny coastal Strip, which is surrounded by a security fence.
Israel separates Gaza from the larger part of the occupied territories, the West Bank, and there is an agreement in principle for a land link between the two pieces of land.
The World Bank, in consultation with Israel, has raised the possibility of building a rail link or a 42km sunken road from Gaza to the West Bank to allow people and goods to move between the two territories.
In the interim, the two sides are discussing arrangements for convoys which would be escorted by the Israelis.
Mr Wolfensohn has predicted that Israel's freeing of economic constraints, accompanied by internal reform and additional donor money, would allow the Palestinian economy to turn the corner.