Settlers protested in Gush Katif on Wednesday in the Gaza Strip.
(Rina Castelnuovo for The New York Times)
An armed Jewish settler and his family are seen as a group of Jewish settlers and opponents of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's plan to withdraw from the Gaza strip and four West Bank settlements walk up a hill outside the northern West Bank settlement of Homesh, Thursday April 28, 2005. About 10,000 Israelis streamed into Homesh, one of the West Bank settlements slated for evacuation to protest against the evacuation plan. The rally, far smaller than organizers had expected, followed a protest by in a Gaza settlement bloc on Wednesday that was also far smaller than planned.(AP Photo/Ariel Schalit)
GUSH KATIF, Gaza Strip (Reuters)
Tens of thousands of Israelis protested in Gaza's Jewish settlements on Wednesday against Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's plan to abandon the strip this summer after 38 years of occupation.At least 40,000 sympathizers joined the show of defiance after exhausting political avenues for stopping Israel's first removal of settlements from land where Palestinians seek a state, witnesses said.
Settlers said there were 80,000 demonstrators .... the atmosphere on the day was of carnival not confrontation.
"We will be here forever," said one banner, bright orange in the color of the local authority's flag that has become a symbol of the wider protest.
Israeli Jewish settlers of Ethiopian origin dance as settlers and opponents of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's plan to pull out of the Gaza Strip and four West Bank settlements gather in the northern West Bank settlement of Sa Nur, Thursday April 28, 2005.... (AP Photo/Ariel Schalit)
During Wednesday's rally, Palestinians fired two rockets and three mortars toward the settlement bloc, and one soldier was slightly injured by shrapnel, the Israeli military said.
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