The disengagement is starting to pummel The Bubble. Today a bunch of us regulars were sitting around the bar at my local cafe, Ginzburg, when suddenly Itai's* girlfriend called out, over the head of one guy who was typing on his laptop and another who had his head buried in a newspaper, "Lisa! How many more days until the disengagement?"

I looked up from my newspaper and said, "Um, 42 I think. It's supposed to start on August 16. Why?"

In response, she pointed to Itai. He had a call-up notice for extra army reserve duty in mid-August open in front of him, and he was busy talking to "the authorities" on his mobile phone, trying to find out more details. After he'd ended his conversation I asked him where he was being posted. In a bewildered tone, he said "East Jerusalem, for three weeks. Checkpoints and shit. I've never done checkpoints before. I did my regular service in an artillery unit."

He asked me what the checkpoints were like, and I just looked at him sympathetically. Not fun, I said. Long shifts, not much shelter from the sun, plenty of uncomfortable situations.

It seems that the Border Police who usually staff the checkpoints in East Jerusalem are being sent to Gaza for the disengagement, and that they're going to be replaced by reserve soldiers.

Itai is an actor whose last paying job was a small role in a TV advertisement for El Al. He's a bearded "struggling artist" type, a typical Tel Aviv bohemian, who doesn't let his dimunitive size stop him from flirting with practically every girl he sees. His girlfriend is a super-cool woman who has plenty of natural self-confidence; she just grins when Itai directs his ironic bedroom eyes at someone other than her. I can't quite picture him checking ID cards and looking for "suspicious objects." Actually, I can't picture him in an artillery unit either.

It turned out that Itai wouldn't be able to get out of his extra reserve duty.

It also turned out that the guy sitting next to me had been called up, too. He's a theatre lighting technician who did his regular service as an army photographer, and he's being sent to Gush Katif for 55 days - to document the withdrawal.

We said that we'd probably see each other in "the Gush" in August. I warned him not to eat at the shawarma joint in Neve Dekalim. (don't ask).

Later an Israeli photojournalist friend told me about this family he'd met in the area of Northern Samaria that's also being evacuated. The family consisted of octogenarian grandparents who barely speak Hebrew, their divorced middle-aged daughter - who supports the whole family - and her son, who's doing his regular army service. They originally moved to the West Bank for economic reasons. Now they're leaving their little house with the garden and moving to nearby Afula, to a small apartment in a not-so-great neighbourhood. It's all they can afford; their compensation is about $125,000, and you can't buy a whole lot with that - not even in Afula. My friend said the daughter was at work when he visited, and the grandparents were sitting there surrounded by boxes, looking as if they didn't know what had hit them.

I've been told - but haven't verified - that Gush Katif residents will receive substantially higher compensation than Northern Samaria residents. Hebrew speakers who are curious to find out how much they'd get if they were being evacauted from the Gush can plug their numbers into this government form and receive the answer instantly. My friend Ilan (he with the PhD in pure mathematics) lives with his wife and two small children in a 90 metre square apartment in central Tel Aviv; if the apartment were in Gush Katif, he'd get about $225,000 in compensation. Not a lot, to be sure, but enough for a reasonably nice place in a moshav or a small town that's outside of central Israel.

But there are other factors that can't be quantified, of course: like uprooting your children from their schools and leaving your community, a place where you didn't lock the doors and could trust your neighbours to watch the kids when you were late coming home from work.

Last week another Israeli journalist friend (Hi, A.) had his car windows smashed by some Jewish extremists. My friend was covering the IDF's evacuation of the extremists from the Maoz Yam outpost in which they'd taken up illegal residence. As those of you who followed this story know, the evacuation became rather, um, violent.

Meanwhile, hundred of foreign journalists are pouring into the country and rushing off to cover the story in Gush Katif. Based on the questions I've been asked and the stories I've heard, I'd say that the news from the Middle East this summer is going to be more live theatre than factual reporting. With a lot of these guys, it's not "take me to your leader" but "take me to your extremists."

All this is my way of saying the following: The situation is heating up here; it's not pleasant; it's very complex; as usual, the people with the least power are paying the highest price; and I really wish this painful enterprise had been planned and executed in a more organized, sensitive fashion.


*Not his real name, don'tcha know.