For the most diehard Jewish settlers, the last view of their doomed homes on the Gaza coast is likely to be from a cage as it swings high over the uniform red roofs, whitewashed walls and neatly tended gardens to deliver them to the security forces.
At midnight, as the deadline passed for Israelis to leave the 17 condemned settlements in the Gaza Strip and four small ones in the northern West Bank, the government was still banking on most of the 8,000 settlers going quietly.
Prime minister Ariel Sharon has tried to lure them out with generous compensation packages far above the true value of the properties left behind and with appeals to consider the national good.
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