Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has said he is considering delaying Israel's planned withdrawal from the Gaza Strip this summer by three weeks.

The announcement on Monday came as government officials confirmed Israel is planning to build 50 new homes in a West Bank settlement, a week after US President George W. Bush demanded a freeze on such construction.

Sharon said he would discuss the possible delay in the Gaza pullout, which is currently scheduled to begin in late July, at a meeting with top ministers on Tuesday.

Israel TV reported he had decided to delay the evacuation.

Mourning period

Talking to reporters earlier, Sharon hinted he would support the delay out of respect for a three-week Jewish mourning period that culminates with Tisha B'Av, the date on the Jewish calendar marking the so-called destruction of the biblical temples.

Tisha B'av falls on 14 August this year.

"We have to take every step to make it easier for the settlers," Sharon said. "These are difficult days today."

The plan calls for removing 9000 Israelis from all 21 settlements in the Gaza Strip and four small settlements in the West Bank. Under the proposed change, the start of the four-week operation would be bumped back to 15 August from 25 July.

Israel Vice Prime Minister Shimon Peres said he was caught off guard by the possible delay. "We knew all of these events beforehand. Why did they wait until the last minute?" he said on Israel Radio.

Petitions rejected

Israeli officials declined to say why Sharon had waited so long to reconsider, saying only that many factors were considered in setting the original timeline.

Separately, opponents of Israel's planned withdrawal from the Gaza Strip failed on Monday to persuade the supreme court to block a law paving the way for a pullout this summer.

The court rejected eight petitions for an injunction against the evacuation compensation bill that was approved by the Israeli parliament in February, according to a text of the decision released to news media.

The legislation effectively gave the government the go-ahead to proceed with the pullout. Due to the sensitivity of the issue, an expanded panel of 11 judges heard the petitions, which included arguments that uprooting settlers would violate their human and property rights.

Tenders issued

Also on Monday, Israeli authorities issued a tender inviting bids for the construction of 50 new homes at an illegal settlement in the occupied northern West Bank.

The publication of the tender comes less than a week after US President George Bush told Sharon to conform to the internationally drafted road map peace plan which expressly forbids expansion of colonies.

Yaakov Harel, a spokesman for the Israel Lands Authority, said the tender had been issued for the religious settlement of Elkana, which is currently home to more than 3250 people.

The houses will be built by private entrepreneurs on state land, he said.

The move was promptly denounced by the Palestinians as well as the Israeli anti-settlement watchdog Peace Now as a clear violation of the government's commitments under an internationally drafted peace plan known as the road map.

"We regard this launch of a new tender process extremely seriously," Palestinian chief negotiator Saib Uraiqat said.

Vision in danger

"While the Israelis talk about leaving 2100 housing units in the Gaza Strip and northern West Bank, they are at the same time tripling the numbers in other parts of the West Bank and [occupied east] Jersualem," Uraiqat said.

"This will destroy President Bush's two-state vision. It now appears the disengagement plan is a substitute for the road map."

A Peace Now spokesman said the construction is clearly part of Sharon's plan to reinforce control of the settlement blocs in the West Bank despite the commitments made by Israel.

Dror Etkes said: "This kind of expansion bolsters extremists on both sides."

Against this backdrop of raging controversy, Aljazeera's correspondent in Palestine on Monday reported that two Israeli soldiers were wounded when Palestinian fighters opened fire at them near Tal Zaarab in Rafah refugee camp in southern Gaza.

In a telephone call, the Brigades of al-Nasir Salah al-Din, the armed wing of the Palestinian popular resistance committees, claimed responsibility for the attack.

PHOTO CAPTION

A wounded soldier is rushed to the Soroka hospital in the southern Israeli town of Beersheba Monday April 18, 2005. (AP)