“This is a day of happiness and joy that the Palestinian people have not witnessed for a century,” President Mahmoud Abbas told reporters in Gaza City. Thousands of Palestinian security men waving victory signs took over while Israeli tanks and armoured vehicles trundled out under cover of darkness, for the first time giving up settlements on land that Palestinians want for a state.

Shortly after sunrise, Israeli soldiers closed the gates of the main crossing to the abandoned settlements. “The mission has been completed,” said Brigadier Aviv Kochavi. “Israel’s presence of 38 years has come to an end.” Attacking symbols of the hated Israeli occupation, youths set ablaze several of the synagogues left behind in the 21 settlements evacuated last month under Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s plan to “disengage” from conflict.

Removing Gaza’s 8,500 settlers has won Sharon international accolades and Washington hopes it will revive peacemaking. But while Palestinians welcome the pullout, they fear Sharon is trading Gaza, home to 1.4 million Palestinians, for a permanent hold on larger areas of the occupied West Bank where 245,000 Jewish settlers live isolated from 2.4 million Arabs. Palestinians are also angry that Israel, citing security reasons, will continue to control Gaza’s border crossings, air space and waters and say the occupation is far from over.

<B>“Militants were among the first to scramble into the settlements, trying to plant their faction’s flags on the highest ground.”</B>

Celebrating Palestinians chanted “Allahu Akhbar” (God is greatest) and held up pictures of militants killed in an uprising. Some kissed the ground. Others scampered down to pristine beaches they could not reach for years.

“Today is the happiest day in my life,” said Jawad Abu Lafi, 50, after praying amid the rubble of one former settlement. Israeli troops cheered and hugged each other as they crossed out of Gaza, scene of some of the worst violence since the uprising blew up in 2000 after peace talks failed.

The poor territory is a volatile testing ground for statehood. President Abbas’s first task will be to enforce law and order in the Gaza Strip and rein in powerful militant groups which refuse to disarm. Israel has threatened massive retaliation if attacks from Gaza continue. “We will not tolerate their ineptitude, turn a blind eye to their failures or ignore acts of terror. They will not be able to shirk their responsibility,” said army chief of staff Dan Halutz.

Militants were among the first to scramble into the settlements, trying to plant their faction’s flags on the highest ground. At Abbas’s behest, militants kept to a seven-month-old ceasefire to smooth the Israeli pullout.

“Four years of our resistance have done more than 10 years of negotiations,” said one masked militant from the Islamic Hamas group inside a settlement. Rightist Israeli opponents of the withdrawal had called the evacuation of Gaza’s 8,500 settlers a capitulation to the militants. Many settlers saw Gaza as a biblical birthright, but most Israelis were happy to abandon its costly presence.

“There is no more appropriate time to use the expression better late than never,” wrote commentator Ben Caspit in the Maariv daily. “Israel is sliding out of Gaza with a feeling of having a burden lifted.” A spokesman for the settler movement said they hoped to return to Gaza again one day to build on the rubble.

Only synagogues and public buildings were left standing. Palestinians were angry at Israel’s decision to leave the synagogues, torn between wanting to erase emblems of Israel and uncomfortable at being seen destroying places of worship. Sharon’s support for leaving the synagogues could help him win backing from Israel’s religious constituency in a power struggle with opponents of the Gaza withdrawal.

<B>Nidal AL-MUGHRABI</B>