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JERUSALEM - Israel will transfer Jewish settlements in the Gaza Strip to the Palestinians intact, the defense minister decided Thursday, reversing an earlier plan to destroy all homes during this summer's withdrawal.
The decision, which would need Cabinet approval, was made in a meeting with top Israeli security officials. Deputy Defense Minister Zeev Boim said international reaction and environmental concerns led Shaul Mofaz to change his earlier decision to knock down the homes.
"Taking all those things into account, the defense minister made a recommendation not to destroy the private houses," Boim told Army Radio.
The question of what to do with the hundreds of red-roofed houses scattered throughout Gaza in 21 settlements has vexed the Israeli government for months.
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and his top aides also toured the Nitzanim area north of the Gaza Strip to survey a possible relocation site for the settlers. He spent about 15 minutes in an area north of the town of Nitzan, checking maps with his aides, before leaving. Sharon said he would have an answer about the plan in the coming days.
Mofaz initially had recommended destruction of the homes and greenhouses in the settlements. Israel had wanted to avoid scenes of jubilant Palestinians taking over the settlers' homes.
But many expressed concern that destroying the houses would damage the environment, make the pullout process longer and more expensive than planned, and generate international criticism. In 1982, Israel was heavily criticized for razing the settlement of Yamit and others when it withdrew from the Sinai desert under terms of a peace treaty with Egypt.
On Tuesday, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice urged Israel not to engage in "wanton destruction" of the settlers' homes.
Under Mofaz's new plan, the settlement synagogues and ritual baths would be dismantled and moved to Israel. The mezuzahs - religious objects attached to door frames - also would be removed.
The buildings will be handed over, to the Palestinians or to a world agency, once the evacuation is completed, according to the plan. Army bases would be destroyed.
The Palestinian leadership has yet to announce its plans for the houses and the land the settlers will be evacuating. Some wanted the houses to remain, while others argued it would be better to replace them with higher-density housing projects. Some officials feared the houses would be doled out as perks to Palestinian officials.
Most settlers live in single-family homes, with small yards, that are suitable for a family of five or six. Palestinians often live as extended families with 15 or 20 relatives.
Palestinian officials have raised the possibility of tearing down the homes, even if the Israelis leave them in place, and building homes that could accommodate the larger Palestinian families.
The Palestinians are also considering other options, such as turning the homes, most near the coastline, into cottages for tourists.
With thousands of Palestinians in Gaza rendered homeless in the past several years of fighting, there is the prospect that these families will rush into the vacated homes once the Israelis depart. Palestinian officials have complained Israeli officials were not negotiating the pullout with them and criticized Mofaz's unilateral decision.
Meanwhile, Palestinian militants fired a rocket from northern Gaza toward the Israeli town of Sderot. The rocket exploded harmlessly in a field, but Israeli officials said it was a sign Palestinians are not moving against militants.
Since Feb. 8, when Israeli and Palestinian leaders declared an end to more than four years of bloodshed, such rocket attacks have been rare. No one claimed responsibility for the rocket launching.
Government officials hope the Nitzanim plan will weaken settler opposition, but security officials have expressed concerns that some might resist evacuation violently. Police said Thursday they have stepped up their level of alert at the hilltop holy site in the Old City of Jerusalem revered by Jews as the Temple Mount and Muslims as Haram al-Sharif. Security officials fear Jewish extremists, who are planning a rally there Sunday, would try to attack the site in an effort to stop the pullout.
Some Gaza settlers have said their resistance to the withdrawal could crumble if the government moved their communities en masse to the Nitzanim area and gave them suitable farmland. The plan also has angered environmentalists, worried the new communities there would destroy sensitive sand dunes and nature reserves.
Information from the New York Times was used in this report.