Nearly 18 months after they were forcibly uprooted from their communities in the Gaza Strip, resettling some 8,000 former Jewish settlers is to be become a top priority for the Israeli government, promised Ehud Olmert on Tuesday.

“The vision of resettling the Katif Bloc evacuees in the Lachish area (of southern Israel) is from now on the Israeli government’s vision,” Ha’aretz quoted Olmert as telling reporters during a tour of the area by top government officials.

Official plans for the area call for the construction of seven full communities to mirror the network of communities the settlers had created in southern Gaza over a period of three decades.

“I would like, not in one year, but already within six months to come here again to see the tractors working and to breathe in the dust, to see the foundations being poured and the buildings rising,” Olmert added. “There is no reason that this will not happen.”

But other officials who participated in the tour expressed outrage that construction had not already begun.

“There is no justification for this foot-dragging,” stated Construction and Housing Minister Meir Sheetrit. “With all due respect, this is not the way to work. This could have all been approved overnight.”

Housing Ministry CEO Arieh Bar reportedly told Olmert, “I have harsh things to say to you. Our hands are being tied. We need fast decisions.”

To date, only 200 of the 1,350 Jewish families that once inhabited the Gaza Strip have received land from the state to build new permanent homes, the Disengagement Authority that planned and executed the evacuation told The Jerusalem Post.