By Nadav Shragai, Haaretz Correspondent  
Almost two years after the disengagement from Gaza, construction of permanent housing has begun at only two of the 26 sites intended for 9,000 evacuees, according to a report by the Gush Katif Settlements Committee.
For example, no groundwork has been laid at Nitzanim and Talmei Yafe, projects decided upon months before the disengagement began.
The committee predicts that the trailer parks now housing the evacuees will remain in use for at least five years, instead of the two years that the government intended. The resulting problems are legion.    
-Some 1,450 former residents of Gush Katif are still unemployed.
-More than 500 families are in bad financial shape, and some even receive food packages and help from welfare agencies.
-Because of the rampant unemployment, many families are using their state compensation funds for daily subsistence instead of saving it for building a house.
-Only 33 farmers out of 400 have been given alternate lands, and of these, only a handful are back in real business. Those who resumed growing crops face major infrastructure hurdles such as erratic electricity, sewage, drainage, etc.
-Farmers lost their overseas markets, buyers and distributors.
-A memorandum of understanding with the government on amendments to the Evacuation Compensation Law improved matters on a personal level. However, business owners and farmers will not be compensated for lost income until they can rebuild their businesses. Furthermore, compensation for Gush Katif evacuees is low and does not reflect the true value of their property. For instance, compensation for greenhouses is 60 percent of the cost of erecting them. Compensation for seniority is 10 percent of that granted to people evacuated from Yamit under the peace treaty with Egypt. And 650 people who requested individual property appraisals have received either no decision or a very low assessment, because the state froze individual appraisals after it turned out that many were higher than the compensation afforded by the law.
Despite all the above, the committee noted that more than 85 percent of evacuees continue to live in a community framework, in order to uphold their ideals and provide a support network for each other.
MK Uri Ariel, who chairs both the National Union-National Religious Party faction and the Knesset lobby for the evacuees, said the report underscores the state's colossal failures. "Housing at temporary sites is continuing long beyond the period intended, and no government ministry has a working plan for the extended stay," he said.
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