Rafah, Gaza Strip — Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas promised freedom, jobs and homes for the people of Gaza once Israel completes its pullout. Hours before he spoke Friday at Gaza's abandoned airport, an Israeli bulldozer demolished the first Jewish settlement, clearing land for Palestinian development.
In the settlement of Gadid, Israeli troops expelled the last settlers holed up in a synagogue, crashing through a flaming barricade of cars, wooden planks and garbage bins. Then, Israel suspended evicting settlers for the Jewish Sabbath, having evacuated 87 percent of Gaza's settlers in just 2 1/2 days. All but four settlements were vacant.
Smiling and waving to a cheering crowd at the closed Gaza International Airport, Abbas said Israel's departure was bringing "historic days of joy" to the Palestinians.
In his first major speech since Israel began pulling out on Monday, he promised that the airport, whose runways were destroyed by Israel in fighting in 2000, would again become a gateway for Palestinians - though that will require Israel's blessing.
Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas gestures as he addresses a crowd during a celebration for Israel's Gaza withdrawal, at the Gaza international airport outside Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip. Abbas on Friday promised his people jobs, freedom of movement and new homes after Israel's Gaza pullout.
Abbas also pledged the Palestinian Authority would rebuild homes demolished by Israel during the past five years of conflict. He promised to reserve 5 percent of government jobs for the disabled, mainly war wounded.
He told the crowd that Israel was quitting Gaza because of Palestinian "sacrifices" and "patience," and he promised the withdrawal would lead to further pullouts from the West Bank and Jerusalem.
Earlier, hundreds of Palestinians from the town of Rafah offered prayers of thanks in sandy open ground within sight of two deserted settlements, celebrating the coming return of land - captured by Israel in the 1967 Mideast war - that became home to 8,500 Jewish settlers.
"We won, so we came to thank God for our victory," said Abdel Raouf Barbar, an official of Abbas's Fatah party. With parliamentary elections scheduled in January, the party is competing with the Islamic group Hamas to claim credit for the Israeli withdrawal.
On Friday, two Hamas militants were wounded when an explosive device they were carrying accidentally blew up before they could plant it near the evacuated Kfar Darom settlement, Palestinian officials said.
The extent of their injuries was unknown, said the security officials, who cannot be identified because they are not authorized to speak to the media. The militants apparently wanted to target Israeli troops still guarding the emptied settlement to bolster Hamas claims of having driven the Israelis from Gaza.
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, the settlers' former patron who became the architect of the Gaza pullout, said the violence infuriated him.
Sharon had said he was reduced to tears watching images of settlers losing their homes. But after seeing what happened at Kfar Darom, he told the Haaretz daily "my mood altered and the pain turned to rage."
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