The Arab-Israeli confrontation is one of the largest armed and political conflicts, for more than half a century destabilizing the situation in the Middle East. Intifada is one of the most striking episodes of this struggle. It manifested itself both in acts of civil disobedience and in direct armed actions of the opposing parties. Let's find out in more detail what intifada is, and follow its chronology.
History of the Arab-Israeli confrontation
But first, in order to have a more accurate idea of the situation that led to the emergence of this movement, we will need to delve into the history of the Arab-Israeli confrontation.
Although conflicts between Jews and Arabs of Palestine have occurred since the end of the First World War, they gained real scale only after the formation of the state of Israel in 1948. According to a UN decision, the creation of an Arab state was also supposed on Palestinian lands, but for a number of reasons this idea was never realized.
Already at the initial stage of the existence of Israel, almost all Arab countries refused to recognize it as a legitimate entity. In 1947-1949, the Israelis had to enter the war for independence with a coalition of Arab states. The result was a landslide victory for Israel. In addition to gaining independence, the new country was able to seize a number of territories that were intended for the never-created Arab state in Palestine.
But that was only the beginning. A whole series of new conflicts followed. And in almost all, Israel triumphed and annexed new lands inhabited by Arabs.
Thus, by the mid-80s, almost the entire territory that was intended to create an Arab state on Palestinian lands was under Israeli occupation. Relations between the Israelis and the inhabitants of the occupied territories were extremely tense, which created the prerequisites for a wave of disobedience and new armed conflicts. Back in 1967, the PLO organization was created, the purpose of which was the elimination of the occupation regime (through armed and political struggle) and the creation of an independent state of Palestine.
The essence of the term "intifada"
Now let's find out what the term intifada specifically means. This concept is literally translated from Arabic as "rebellion". It came into widespread use at the end of the 80s of the 20th century, when a disobedience movement began in the occupied territories of Palestine, which turned into an open armed and even terrorist form of struggle.
Thus, the Arab intifada is a Palestinian rebellion against the occupation authorities.
The background of the uprising
As mentioned above, the Palestinian Arab population was extremely negative towards the occupation authorities of Israel, and those, in turn, in every way oppressed the local population, seeing them as enemies. According to the Palestinians themselves, these harassment of the Israeli administration was repressive.
Just before the first intifada began, namely in mid-1987, several Israelis were killed, only one of whom was a soldier. This fact has further heated up the already turbulent situation. The unrest took on a massive scale, with acts of cruelty on both sides. The situation escalated especially in the Gaza Strip, the Israeli-occupied Palestinian territory bordering Egypt.
Oil on fire was added by the refusal of Egypt and Jordan from the Palestinian lands. That is, a situation in which local Arabs did not actually have any political rights was mothballed.
The radical organizations Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Hamas began to gain increasing popularity among the inhabitants of the occupied territories. At the same time, the activities of the PLO became more active.
The beginning of the first intifada
The Palestinian intifada began in December 1987. The catastrophe of the Arabs was a car accident that arose as a result of the collision of an Israeli military truck and a truck carrying a large number of Palestinians. In this accident, many local residents died. The Palestinians took the tragic event as a deliberate revenge of the Israelis.
Mass riots began. Initially, the Palestinians used stones and other improvised means as tools against the Israelis, so the second name of this intifada is “the war of stones”.
Further developments of the first intifada
The Israeli military in response to stones flying in them began to open aimed fire, which further exacerbated the situation. The uprising spread to the western bank of the Jordan River, and in the second half of December reached Jerusalem, which Israel considered its capital.
The first Palestinian intifada was marked by a large number of adolescents participating in it. Over time, in addition to stones, the rebels began to use “Molotov cocktails” and firearms. Nevertheless, the Israeli army possessed an overwhelming material advantage over the rebels, which allowed it, in the end, to cope with them.
During the uprising, about two thousand local Arabs and 111 Israelis died.
Peace agreements
It is significant that the events of the intifada contributed to a split in Israeli society itself. Many Israelis were ready to make concessions to the Palestinians in order to maintain peace and prevent similar conflicts in the future. This situation led to the fact that in Israel the “party of peace”, led by Yitzhak Rabin, won the election.
The Israeli government has entered into negotiations with Palestinian leaders represented by PLO representatives. In 1993, Oslo signed peace agreements between Yitzhak Rabin and PLO head Yasser Arafat, which envisaged the creation of the Palestinian Authority. This event can be considered the completion of the first intifada.
Background to the second intifada
However, the main contradictions between the Israelis and the inhabitants of Palestine - even after the signing of the treaty in Oslo - were not removed, and they later served as prerequisites for the conflict, known as the second intifada.
The formal reason for the new uprising was the visit of Ariel Sharon in 2000 to the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. The Palestinians saw a violation of the agreements in this incident, although the Israeli side insisted that, according to the agreements, access to this shrine was open to people who profess any religion.
In any case, the event mentioned was only a catalyst, and not the root cause of a new uprising, known as the Al-Aqsa Intifada. That was the name of one of the mosques on the Temple Mount.
Beginning of the second intifada
The second intifada (Al-Aqsa intifada) began with the riots in September 2000 on the same day when a significant visit to the Temple Mount took place. The very next day, tens of thousands of people took part in the unrest.
Government forces used firearms against them, resulting in numerous casualties on both sides. Israeli authorities also used aircraft, which attacked a number of Palestinian settlements.
It is also worth noting that the second intifada in Israel, unlike the first, was accompanied by mass indignation among Arabs who have Israeli citizenship.
Further Al-Aqsa Intifada Events
In the meantime, the intifada in Israel has become increasingly widespread. Palestinian radical organizations carried out a series of terrorist attacks against the Israelis.
The most active actions of the rebels date back to 2002. In response, the Israeli army conducted Operation Defensive Wall, which was able to almost completely stop the intifada on the territory of Israel itself, but, nevertheless, unrest continued on the lands of the Palestinian Authority. However, in the future the uprising began to decline and by 2005 it had almost completely stopped, although some sources consider only the year 2008 to be the final completion of the second intifada.
During the clashes over the entire period from 2000 to 2005, more than 3, 100 Palestinians and about one thousand Israelis were killed. If we consider the end of the intifada 2008, the number of victims will increase significantly. Among Palestinians, it will amount to almost five thousand, and among Israelis, 1, 200.
The consequences of the intifada
Both sides of the conflict realized that the intifada is the path to destruction, because in the economic indicators of both Israel and the Palestinian Authority there has been a significant decline, not to mention the loss of life. The tourism industry was particularly affected, because few vacationers would want to go to a country where active hostilities are taking place.
Although no formal agreement was signed between the Palestinians and the Israeli leadership, they both made some concessions. So, in 2005, the Government of the State of Israel decided to finally withdraw from the Gaza Strip Israeli troops, administration and settlers. In turn, the leaders of the Palestinian resistance also contributed to reducing the intensity of the confrontation.
However, these steps, like the agreements after the first intifada, did not solve the problems of relations between Arabs and Israelis, but only froze the current situation. The most extremist Palestinian organizations have decided to continue the struggle, in response to which Israel in 2008 conducted a special operation in the Gaza Strip.
