In order to resettle the 9,000 Israeli settlers affected by the pullout plan, the Israeli government provides a compensation bill and two housing options.

With an earmarked 930 million US dollars, the compensation bill will give each family about 1,100 US dollars for each year they had lived in Gaza or northern West Bank settlements.

On average, each family will receive half a dunam (1/8 of an acre) of land and money for the value of their homes, ranging from 800 dollars to 1,000 dollars per square meter.

In other words, each relocated family is expected to receive between 200,000 dollars to 300,000 dollars in compensation.

At the same time, Israeli government has offered settlers an additional grant of 30,000 dollars in compensation for their voluntary evacuation from four northern West Bank settlements before the official onset date of the pullout.

The grant is on condition that the recipient moves and buys a house in the periphery, in the area near the Green Line, Israel's pre-1967 border with the West Bank.

As for their new homes, evacuees can choose either permanent housing or temporary housing.

For the option of permanent housing, evacuees can move to permanent homes being built by the government across the souther Negev area on state land, thus using up most of the compensation payments.

Roughly 600 families have agreements with the government, of whom some 360 have filed individual claims, and the rest by group, for the permanent homes.

Some can choose to go to Israeli towns and kibbutzes throughout the country and others will be accommodated in new homes built in areas outside the Gaza Strip.

For the temporary housing, evacuees can choose to rent a house first, a way that provides them enough time to find an ideal place to dwell at.

The government provides some 850 vacant apartments all over the Negev area, south of Israel, and applies rent control, making rental prices range between 350-550 dollars a month.

Between 300-350 temporary caravans have been constructed around the coastal community of Nitzan, located between Ashdod and Ashkelon.

Temporary structures such as makeshift caravans, industrial buildings and cabins have also been built across the Negev, predominantly in kibbutzim and moshavim.

Evacuees who choose to live in temporary apartments can take the compensation funds and build a new home wherever they wish.

They also can use the money to build a house on undeveloped government land that the government has set aside for pullout evacuees to enable communities to move en masse.

A sticking point in negotiations between the settler groups and the Israeli government has been the quality of permanent homes built by the government, since many settlers refuse to move into temporary accommodation.

A compromise solution has been reached in some cases, for example in Nitzanim, north of the Gaza Strip, where relocated settlers will live in temporary buildings until permanent homes are built nearby.

Source: Xinhua