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Second Intifada

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The al-Aqsa, or Second, Intifada is the intifada (the wave of violence and political conflict) that began in 2000 between Israel and the Palestinians.

Prior causes

During the 1990s, Israel's settler population in neighbouring Palestine nearly doubled; the Palestinians often cite this as the main reason for the outburst of hostilities. Israel alleges that the question of settlements was not as acute as often displayed, and the Intifada was initially intended by the PA leadership only as a tactical step to give more weight to the Palestinian positions on several issues (see Proposals for a Palestinian state) which were rejected by the Israeli government in the Camp David 2000 Summit. This is rejected outright as a mere fabrication by the Palestinians although Marwan Barghouti told the press that the uprising was planned by the PA (Palestinian Authority) before the summit. Following Israel's pullout from Lebanon in May 2000, the PLO official Farouk Kaddoumi told reporters: "We are optimistic. Hezbollah"s resistance can be used as an example for other Arabs seeking to regain their rights".

Beginning of hostilities

The real upsurge in the intifada began after Ariel Sharon's visit to the Temple Mount. Both sides, however, view the violence as having earlier roots.

Israeli officials cite a small increase in violence had begun even earlier. Since at least September 13, 2000, militants from the Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat's Fatah militant movement carried out a number of attacks at Israeli targets, military and civilian, in violation of Oslo Accords. In addition, the Israeli agency Palestinian Media Watch states that the Palestinian official TV broadcasts became increasingly militant during the summer of 2000, as Camp David negotiations faltered. On September 27, the new Intifada claimed its first Israeli victim, the military officer Sgt. David Biri ( Information from Israeli government).

From the Palestinian side, it began earlier as well. The effects of Oslo, widely hoped for as an end to occupation, became seen as just another form of colonialism, with control remaining still in the hands of Israel. It was seen as only benefiting Israel and Arafat, not the people themselves. The agreement also led to the further collapse of the Palestinian economy, with a drop in the standard of living by 30%, and a 50% unemployment rate. The rapidly increasing settler population, and the subsequent uncompensated enlargement of "buffer zones" around the settlements, left them viewing the arrangement as merely cover for Israel to illegally seize what little remained of their land. The Palestinian Authority became draconian in its attempts to enforce Oslo, shutting down independent media and jailing opponents.. Israeli restrictions on trade, investment, and most critically, water resources that were already being monopolized by Israel, led to increased unrest amongst Palestinians. Reports of those who lost their land only worsened it They were additionally incensed by remarks from right-wing Israeli government members, such as Rehavam Zeevi referring to the Palestinian people as "a cancer" and "vermin".

Timeline

On September 28, 2000, the Israeli opposition leader, Ariel Sharon visited the Temple Mount (also called Al-Haram As-Sharif) in Jerusalem, a holy site for Islam, Christianity and Judaism (the Islamic holy site is the al-Aqsa Mosque, and the Jewish one - the Western Wall). Prior to his visit some moderates on both sides protested Sharon's visit, because of his controversial political stance and his massive armed bodyguard - over 1,000 strong. He was warned that this would lead to riots. Sharon declared, on the other hand, that he went to the site with a message of peace. However, on the site, he proclaimed the area as eternal Israeli territory (in essence anti-Arab). Following Sharon's visit, large riots broke out around Old Jerusalem; in the riots, several Palestinians were shot dead. One of them, a 12 year old boy, Muhammed A-Dura, was captured on camera and broadcast around the world. Images of the boy and his father attempting to hide behind a concrete water barrel while a barrage of bullets flew by caused much outrage throughout the world. (Recent investigations into the matter, the most notable aired in a prominent documentary by the independent German Television Station ARD, have questioned whether Israeli soldiers shot him, claiming that the position of the soldiers and the angle of the bullet wound imply that he was hit by other Palestinians in the crossfire. These claims have been denied by the original cameraman and the boy's father, as well as an amnesty international report [1] , in that the shooting from the Palestinian outpost had stopped 45 minutes before he was killed.) On the other side, the lynching of two Israeli reservists in Ramallah catalyzed the downfall of dovish Prime Minister Ehud Barak and the rise of Ariel Sharon in general election held at February 2001.

Subsequently, a spate of suicide bombings was launched against Israel, which met a quick response. Ariel Sharon ordered Operation Defensive Shield (in April 2002) after a suicide bombing called the Passover Massacre, which killed 30 Israelis. The operation led to the apprehension of numerous members of terrorist organizations, as well as their weaponry and equipment. The operation however came at a cost of 35 soldiers killed in action, 23 of them in Jenin, and the loss of several hundred Palestinian lives. Additionally, there were international accusations of war crimes [2]. In late April, a stand-off developed between Israel and Fatah militants who sought refuge at the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem. The stand-off was resolved after 38 days, by the deportation of 13 militants to Europe.

In January 2002 the IDF Shayetet-13 naval commando captured the Karine A, a large boat carrying weapons from Iran presumably intended to be used by Palestine militants against Israel. It was discovered that top officials in the Palestinian Authority were involved in the smuggling. Israel claim that Yasser Arafat was involved too, was accepted by the American Government.

Following an intelligence report claiming to prove that Arafat paid 20,000$ to Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades, the USA demanded democratic reforms in the PA, as well to appoint a prime minister independent of Arafat. Following the American pressure, Arafat appointed on March 13, 2003 the moderate Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen) as a prime minister.

Following the appointment of Abu Mazen, the USA have raised the Road Map for Peace - George W. Bush's plan to end the violent intifada by disbanding the terrorist organization and the establishment of a Palestinian state. The first phase of the plan demanded the PA to fight terrorism and confiscate all illegal weapons. Instead of fighting terrorism, Abu Mazen tried to reach a cease-fire agreement with the terrorist factions and asked them to halt attacks on Israeli civilian.

In June 2003, the so-called Hudna was signed. The terrorist groups have agreed to halt suicide bombings against Israel for a period of 3 months. The following month was relatively quiet on the Israeli side although several suicide bombing were committed against Israeli civilians; however, however, in Palestine, little changed.. Few roadblocks were removed (159 were left in the West Bank alone), and the IDF continued its policy of "targeted killings" (assassinations) in addition to crowd dispersal and demolitions. One of the more provocative raids was when tanks and APCs invaded a refugee camp outside Nablus, killing four people, two of whom were resistance fighters. On August 19 a suicide bombing attack by Hamas in a crowded bus in Jerusalem killed 23 Israelis, including 7 children. Hamas claimed it was a retaliation for the killing of 5 Palestinians (including Hamas leader Abbedullah Qawasameh) earlier in the week; according to witnesses, a squad of Israeli police disguised as Palestinian labourers opened fire on him as he left a Hebron mosque [3]; the IDF claims he opened fire on them as they attempted to arrest him. US and Israeli media outlets frequently referred to bus bombing as shattering the quiet and bringing an end to the cease-fire; given the number of Palestinian deaths, Palestinians have hotly disputed this assertion.

Following the attack, Israeli Defence Forces pursued all of Hamas leaders in Hebron and in the Gaza Strip. The plotters of the bus suicide bombing were all captured or killed and Hamas leadership in Hebron was wiped out by the IDF. Strict lockdown began to be enforced in Nablus, Jenin, and Tulkarem; the Nablus lockdown lasted for over 100 days. In Nazlet 'Issa, over 60 shops were destroyed by Israeli civil administration bulldozers, in what was described by locals as a scene that rivaled a natural disaster. The Israeli civil administration explained that the shops were demolished because they were built without a permit. [4]

Failing to receive real power from Arafat, Abu Mazen resigned on September 2003. Instead of him, Abu Ala was appointed. Israel's lack of trust in the Palestinian Authority and the ingoing public protest urged the Israeli government to start constructing the Israeli West Bank barrier. The barrier is claimed by Israel to stop suicide bombers from entering Israeli cities, whereas Palestinians claims it is a landgrab.

Following a October 4 suicide bombing in Maxim restaurant, Haifa, which claimed the lives of 21 Israelis, Israel claimed that Syria and Iran who sponsor Islamic Jihad and Hizbullah are responsible to the terrorist attack. Day after the Maxim massacre, IAF warplanes have bombed an allegedly terrorist training base in Ein-Saheb, Syria.

In response to a constant shelling of Israeli settlements on Gaza Strip with Qassam rockets and mortars shells, the IDF operated mainly in Rafah - to search and destroy smuggling tunnels which used by militants to gain illegal weapons from Egypt. Recent raids in Rafah left many families homeless. Israel's official stance is that their houses were captured by militant and were destroyed during battles with IDF forces. Palestinians deny it and claim that many houses were destroyed to create a large buffer zone in the city, displacing several hundred people. The entire southern side of the city was completely destroyed, making it very unlikely that an entire portion of a city had been seized by "terrorists", as can be seen in satellite photos [5]. However, some residents acknowledge the smuggling tunnels as main factor in the unrest and destruction in Rafah, Maariv's journalist Ben Kaspit reports:

"The Palestinian population around Philadelphi is fed up by the going-on. Recently, one tunnel was revealed, when local residents approached IDF soldiers and told them were it is. In another case, after the IDF soldiers and bulldozers destroyed a tunnel, leaving ruins behind them, some local residents shot the tunnel's owner to death." [6], [7].

Many accounts contradict this being a common sentiment. [8] [9] [10].

"Mine is the last home in the street now and it's everything we have.", said Abu Alouf, a resident who has watched her neighbors houses be destroyed one by one. "I have begged them not to destroy it. They know there are no tunnels here, but I don't think it is about that at all. Do they really believe that every house in my street had a tunnel under the border?"
"It's not a matter of tunnels or terrorists," said Yusuf Ashair, a man made homeless in Block J. "They want us out of here, they want us to flee. They don't care if it's a school or a house they destroy. They know that if they destroy it all people will leave."

A member of the International Solidarity Movement who stayed in Rafah, when asked about whether the local people that he met blamed the IDF or the tunnel owners, stated:

"Northern apologists for slavery often said that blacks liked being enslaved. This myth is as rediculous (sic) as (the) notion that the people of Rafah blame anybody other than the military for their miserable situation. The actions of the Israeli military in Rafah have nothing to do with tunnels."

On February 2, 2004 IDF Givati Brigade elite soldier killed the leader of Rafah's Islamic Jihad Yasser Abu al-Aesh, and Mujdi al-Khatib, Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades' top field commander in the camp. Another Hamas gunman was killed in the operation. [11]

On February 2, 2004, Israeli PM Ariel Sharon announced his plan to transfer all the Jewish settlers from the Gaza Strip. The Israeli opposition dismissed his announcement as "media spin" but the Israeli Labour Party said it would support such a move. Sharon's right-wing coalition partners Mafdal and National Union rejected the plan and vowed to quit the government if it will be implemented. Surprisingly, rejection to this move came also from dovish Yossi Beilin, the architect of the Oslo Accords and the Geneva Initiative. He claimed that withdrawing from the Gaza Strip without an agreement will be a prize to terror.

Following the declaration on the disengagement plan by Ariel Sharon and as a response to suicide attacks on Erez Crossing and Ashdod seaport (10 people were killed), the IDF launched series of armoured raids on the Gaza Strip (mainly Rafah and refugee-camps around Gaza), killing about 70 Hamas militants. On March 22, 2004, Israeli helicopter gunship killed Hamas leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, an act which sparked a wave of anger in the Arab world. A month later (April 17), after serveral failed attempt of Hamas to avenge Yassin's death, his successor, Abed al-Aziz Rantissi was killed by IDF helicopter gunship strike.

Tactics

The tactics of the two sides in the conflict are largely based upon their resources and goals. Despite the claims of both sides to the contrary, polling consistently shows that the significant majority of both Palestinians and Israelis agree on the same basic goals: a two state solution, established on the 1967 borders, with at least most of the settlements withdrawn, and right to return only within the borders of the new Palestinian state.

On the Palestinian side, a variety of groups are involved in combat such as Hamas and Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades. They have waged a high-intensity guerrilla warfare campaign against Israel. Military equipment is mostly imported light arms and homemade weapons, such as hand grenades, assault rifles, and the Qassam rocket. They also have increased use of remote-controlled landmines, a tactic which has become increasingly popular among the poorly armed resistance groups. Developed due to the difficulty in targeting the well-armed and armored Israeli Defense Forces, the tactic which they have become most famous for is the suicide bombing. Conducted as a single or double bombing, suicide bombings are generally conducted against "soft" targets (civilians) or "lightly hardened" targets (such as checkpoints) to try to raise the cost of the war to Israelis. Contrary to popular belief, most suicide bombers are not religious radicals, nor are they from the most destitute sections of the population - they generally are relatively well off and well educated, and view their action as a sacrifice intended to remedy an injustice. It is this last tactic which has earned them the most international scorn. On March 14, a 10 year old boy was caught carrying a bomb through a checkpoint, and followed ten days later, a mentally deficient 16 year old had been paid to be a suicide bomber. Unlike most suicide bombings, the use of children in the conflict not only earned condemnation from the United States and from human rights groups such as Amnesty International, but also from many Palestinians and much of the Middle East press archives/2004 News archives/March/26n/Palestinian Backlash Over Child Bombers.htm. The youngest Palestinian suicide bomber was 16 year old Issa Bdeir, a high school student from the village of Al Doha, who shocked his friends and family when he blew himself up in a park in Rishon Letzion, killing a teenage boy and an elderly man.

On the Israeli side, the advantages of a strong economy and arms trade relations, in addition to a centralized command authority, have led to opposite tactics. The Israeli Defense Forces stress the safety of their troops, using such heavily armored equipment as the Merkava tank and various military aircraft. Sniper towers are used extensively in the Gaza Strip, and are being increasingly employed in the West Bank. Heavy armored bulldozers, such as the Caterpillar D9, are routinely employed to detonate booby traps and clear large areas of houses along the border with Egypt, in "buffer zones", and during military operations in the West Bank. Israel has also established the policy of destroying the home of the family of a suicide bomber. Due to the large number of Palestinians who live in a home, the large number of homes destroyed, and collateral damage from home demolitions, they have become an increasingly controversial tactic. With complete ground and air superiority, large arrests are regularly conducted; at any given time, there are about 6,000 prisoners in Israeli jails, about half of them held with charges and half without. Various international aid groups, such as Amnesty International, have documented many incidents of the use of torture [12] ; Israel denies this. Checkpoints, designed to weed out militants and limit the ability to move weapons around, divide most Palestinian cities and interconnections between cities. Transit across checkpoints generally takes 2-8 hours, depending on the current security situation in Israel. Metal shops and other facilities capable of being used to manufacture weapons have been mostly destroyed. The tactic of "Curfew" - long-term lockdown of areas - has been used. Nablus was kept under curfew for over 100 consecutive days, with generally under two hours per day allowed for people to get food or do business. Although these tactics also have been largely internationally condemned, Israel insists they are vital to thwart terrorist attacks. Some cite figures, such as those published in Haaretz newsaper, to prove the effectivness of these methods ( Graph 1: Thwarted attacks (yellow) vs successful attacks (red) - Graph 2: Suicide bombing within the "green line" per quarter ). Others compare the number of suicide bombings between the Intifada and during Oslo, and point out that achieving a peaceful settlement would be far more effective.

The West Bank separation barrier

Claiming that it would protect Israel from terrorist activities, Israel began construction on the West Bank barrier, complete with guard towers and checkpoints similar to Gaza Strip barrier. Most of the barrier is a system of wire fences and trenches, but there is a 8 mile (13 km) section of concrete wall around Qalqilia, where shooting toward Israeli vehicles on the nearby highway has occurred. Reaching as high as 8 meters, the wall will cost an estimated 1.7 million dollars per mile ($1,000/m). Termed a security fence by supporters and an apartheid wall by detractors, it has become another contentious issue in the region. Initially expected to follow the 1967 Green Line, the route instead cuts deeply into the West Bank and may leave about 10% on the Israeli side. The route has cut off some Palestinian towns from their surrounding farmland. In some places there are also secondary barriers east of the main barrier. In October 2003, the Israeli Army declared the area between the barrier and the Green Line (at that time including 12 Palestinian towns or villages) to be forbidden to all adult Palestinians who don't hold special permits, but open to all Jews (not only to Israeli Jews). Some villages refused the permits. Other villages accepted them but found many of their residents were not on the list.

Israel hopes that by constructing this barrier, it will greatly increase their domestic security and the security of the settlements. However, despite its overwhelming support amongst the Israeli public, the settler organizations oppose the barrier for fear that it will eventually become the border of a future Palestinian state, a concept they reject entirely. On October 21, 2001, the United Nations General Assembly passed a resolution (144 -4 with 12 abstentions) declaring the barrier to be illegal, a few days after a similar resolution in the Security Council was vetoed by the United States.

International Involvement

The international community has long taken an involvement in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and this involvement has only increased during the Al-Aqsa Intifada. Israel annually receives 1.2 billion dollars in economic aid and 1.8 billion dollars in military aid from the United States, excluding loan guarantees. The Palestinian Authority generally receives about 100 million dollars in economic aid from the United States, and the Palestinian territories are major humanitarian aid recipients. The conflict has been widely reported in the international press, with a large degree of sympathy for the Palestinians in the Arab world and Europe, and sympathy for the Israelis in United States. As such, it seems only likely that a solution to the conflict will involve 3rd party mediation, either by the United States or the United Nations.

Additionally, private groups have started becoming increasingly involved in the conflict, such as the International Solidarity Movement on the side of the Palestinians, and American-Israeli Public Affairs Committee on the side of the Israelis.

Economic and human costs

In the Palestinian terrorist attacks, about 920 Israelis were killed (up to 2.1.2004), and 4,400 were wounded (source: Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs). The Israeli commerce has experienced much hardship, in particular because of the sharp drop in tourism. A representative of Israel's Chamber of Commerce has estimated the economical damage caused by the crisis as "150 to 200 billion Shekels", or 35 to 45 US $ billion - compared to a GDP of 122 billion dollars (2002).

Following statistics of the Palestine Red Crescent Society 2,417 Palestinians were killed and 22,233 were wounded from September 29, 2000, to August 1, 2003, due to the Israeli military operations. 16 square kilometers of land in the Gaza Strip, most of it agricultural, was razed by Israeli military forces and more than 601 houses were completely destroyed. The UNSCO (Office of the United Nations Special Coordinator in the Occupied Territories) estimates the damage done to the Palestinian economy at over 1.1 billion dollars in the first quarter of 2002, compared to an annual GDP of 4.5 billion dollars. 42% of Gazans are dependent on food aid, and 18% of Gaza children exhibit chronic malnutrition. 85% of Gazans and 58% of Palestinians in the west bank lived below the poverty line.

A study (see below) by the Institute on Combatting Terrorism indicates that nearly 55% of the Palestinians killed were combatants; moreover, the non-combatant Palestinian casualties are mostly male in combatant ages. According to their data, more than 300 Palestinian were killed by action of their own side. Palestinians dispute this, as the report treats most people that were killed as combatants, often much to the dispute of locals and international aid workers. Additionally, to reach these numbers, "combatant age" was defined to include ages 15 and up. Finally, according to the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, this contradicts a calculation, conducted by the Shin Bet which determined that of the 2,341 Palestinians killed up to August 2003, only 551 were combatants - about 23%. [13]

See also

Pro-Israeli

Pro-Palestinian

Other information

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