Second Intifada

Second Intifada
Part of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict
Clockwise from top-left:
Date28 September 2000 – 8 February 2005
(4 years, 4 months, 1 week and 4 days)
Location
Result Uprising suppressed[1][2][3][4][5][6]
Territorial
changes		 Israel withdraws from the Gaza Strip
Belligerents
 Israel

 Palestinian Authority

Commanders and leaders
Units involved
Israel Defense Forces
Israel Police Shin Bet
Mishmeret Yesha

National Security Forces

Fatah Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades
 Abu Ali Mustafa Brigades
 National Resistance Brigades
 al-Qassam Brigades
 Al-Quds Brigades

 Al-Nasser Salah al-Deen Brigades
Casualties and losses

29 September 2000 – 1 January 2005:

~1,010[7][failed verification][8] Israelis total:
• 644–773 Israeli civilians killed by Palestinians;
• 215–301 Israeli troops killed by Palestinians

29 September 2000 – 1 January 2005:

3,179[8][9][10]–3,354[7] Palestinians total:
• 2,739–3,168 Palestinians killed by Israeli troops;*
• 152–406 Palestinians killed by Palestinians;
• 34 Palestinians killed by Israeli civilians
55 foreign nationals/citizens total:
• 45 foreigners killed by Palestinians;
• 10 foreigners killed by Israeli troops[7]
*For the controversial issue of distinguishing Palestinian civilian/combatant casualties, see § Casualties.

The Second Intifada (Arabic: الانتفاضة الثانية, romanized: Al-Intifāḍa aṯ-Ṯhāniya, lit. 'The Second Uprising'; Hebrew: האינתיפאדה השנייה Ha-Intifada ha-Shniya), also known as the Al-Aqsa Intifada,[11] was a major uprising by Palestinians against Israel and its occupation. The period of heightened violence in the Palestinian territories and Israel continued until the Sharm el-Sheikh Summit of 2005, which ended hostilities.[11][12][13]

The general triggers for the unrest are speculated to have been centered on the failure of the 2000 Camp David Summit, which was expected to reach a final agreement on the Israeli–Palestinian peace process in July 2000.[14] An uptick in violent incidents started in September 2000, after Israeli politician Ariel Sharon made a provocative visit to the Temple Mount;[15][14] the visit itself was peaceful, but, as anticipated, sparked protests and riots that Israeli police put down with rubber bullets, live ammunition, and tear gas.[16] Within the first few days of the uprising, the IDF had fired one million rounds of ammunition.[17]

During the first few weeks of the uprising, the ratio of Palestinians to Israelis killed was around 20 to 1.[18] Israeli security forces engaged in gunfights, targeted killings, tank attacks, and airstrikes; Palestinians engaged in gunfights, stone-throwing, and rocket attacks.[19][20] The approximate 138 suicide bombings carried out by Palestinian militant factions after March 2001 became one of the prominent features of the Intifada and mainly targeted Israeli civilians.[21][22][23][24][25] With a combined casualty figure for combatants and civilians, the violence is estimated to have resulted in the deaths of approximately 3,000 Palestinians and 1,000 Israelis, as well as 64 foreign nationals.[26]

The Second Intifada had ended with the Sharm el-Sheikh Summit of 2005,[27] as Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon agreed to take definitive steps to de-escalate the hostilities.[28][29] They also reaffirmed their commitment to the "roadmap for peace" that had been proposed by the Quartet on the Middle East in 2003. Additionally, Sharon agreed to release 900 Palestinian prisoners[30] and further stated that Israeli troops would withdraw from those parts of the West Bank that they had re-occupied while fighting Palestinian militants during the uprising.

  1. ^ Amos Harel; Avi Issacharoff (1 October 2010). "Years of Rage". Haaretz. Archived from the original on 2 July 2014. Retrieved 28 September 2014.
  2. ^ Laura King (28 September 2004). "Losing faith in the intifada". Los Angeles Times. Archived from the original on 21 September 2012. Retrieved 28 September 2014.
  3. ^ Jackson Diehl (27 September 2004). "From Jenin to Falluja". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on 3 February 2014. Retrieved 28 September 2014.
  4. ^ Zeev Chafetz (22 July 2004). "The Intifadeh is over – just listen". World Jewish Review. Archived from the original on 4 August 2014. Retrieved 28 September 2014.
  5. ^ Major-General (res) Yaakov Amidror (23 August 2010). "Winning the counterinsurgency war: The Israeli experience". Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs. Archived from the original on 1 July 2014. Retrieved 28 September 2014.
  6. ^ Hillel Frisch (12 January 2009). "The need for a decisive Israeli victory over Hamas" (PDF). Begin–Sadat Center for Strategic Studies. Archived (PDF) from the original on 23 September 2015. Retrieved 28 September 2014.
  7. ^ a b c "B'Tselem – Statistics – Fatalities". B'Tselem. Archived from the original on 1 July 2010.
  8. ^ a b Cite error: The named reference statspage was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  9. ^ "Intifada toll 2000–2005". BBC News. 8 February 2005. Archived from the original on 17 January 2015. Retrieved 10 November 2012.
  10. ^ "Field Update on Gaza from the Humanitarian Coordinator" (PDF). United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. 9 January 2009. Archived from the original (PDF) on 24 September 2015. Retrieved 28 September 2014.
  11. ^ a b BBC 2004.
  12. ^ Araj, Bader; Brym, Robert J. (2010). "Opportunity, Culture and Agency: Influences on Fatah and Hamas Strategic Action during the Second Intifada". International Sociology. 25 (6): 842–868. doi:10.1177/0268580909351327. ISSN 0268-5809. Archived from the original on 18 May 2024. Retrieved 18 May 2024. Strategic action by the two main Palestinian militant organizations, Fatah and Hamas, during the second intifada or uprising against the Israeli state and people (2000—5). ... during the second intifada, or uprising, of Palestinians against Israel between 2000 and 2005
  13. ^ Smith, Robert B. (1 April 2008). "A Globalized Conflict: European Anti-Jewish Violence during the Second Intifada". Quality & Quantity. 42 (2): 135–180. doi:10.1007/s11135-006-9045-3. ISSN 1573-7845. The globalization of the Arab–Israeli conflict during the period of the second intifada against Israel (from the autumn 2000 through at least the spring of 2005) has fostered anti-Jewish violence in Europe and throughout the world.
  14. ^ a b Pressman 2006, p. 114.
  15. ^ NPR 2014.
  16. ^ Byman 2011, p. 114.
  17. ^ Finkelstein, Norman G. (2008). "4". Beyond Chutzpah: On the misuse of anti-Semitism and the abuse of history (expanded paperback ed.). Berkeley.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  18. ^ Finkelstein, Norman G. (2008). "4". Beyond Chutzpah: On the misuse of anti-Semitism and the abuse of history (expanded paperback ed.). Berkeley.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  19. ^ Cohen, Samy (2010). "Botched Engagement in the Intifada". Israel's Asymmetric Wars. New York: Palgrave Macmillan US. pp. 73–91. doi:10.1057/9780230112971_6. ISBN 978-1-349-28896-0."The al-Aqsa Intifada ushered in an era with a new brand of violence. It began with a popular uprising following Ariel Sharon's visit to Temple Mount on September 28, 2000. But unlike the first Intifada, which was basically a civil uprising against the symbols of an occupation that has lasted since June 1967, the second Intifada very quickly lapsed into an armed struggle between Palestinian activists and the Israeli armed forces. Almost from the very start, armed men took to hiding among crowds of Palestinians, using them as cover to shoot from. The IDF retaliated forcefully, each time causing several casualties."
  20. ^ Kober, Avi (2007). "Targeted Killing during the Second Intifada:: The Quest for Effectiveness". Journal of Conflict Studies. 27 (1): 94–114. ISSN 1198-8614. Archived from the original on 5 April 2022. Retrieved 5 April 2022. Based on the assumption that there was no longer one front or one line of contact, Israel was carrying out dozens of simultaneous operations on the ground and in the air on a daily basis, including TKs, which were supposed to have multi-dimensional effects. According to Byman, TKs were mostly attractive to Israelis as they satisfied domestic demands for a forceful response to Palestinian terrorism. Byman also believes that by bolstering public morale, the TKs helped counter one of the terrorists' primary objectives – to reduce the faith of Israelis in their own government.
  21. ^ Matta, Nada; Rojas, René (2016). "The Second Intifada: A Dual Strategy Arena". European Journal of Sociology / Archives Européennes de Sociologie. 57 (1): 66. doi:10.1017/S0003975616000035. ISSN 0003-9756. S2CID 146939293. Archived from the original on 5 April 2022. Retrieved 5 April 2022. Suicide terror, lethal attacks indiscriminately carried out against civilians via self-immolation, attained prominence in the Palestinian repertoire beginning in March 2001. From that point until the end of 2005, at which point they virtually ceased, 57 suicide bombings were carried out, causing 491 civilian deaths, 73% of the total civilians killed by Palestinian resistance organizations and 50% of all Israeli fatalities during this period. While not the modal coercive tactic, suicide terror was the most efficient in terms of lethality, our basic measure of its efficacy.
  22. ^ Brym, R. J.; Araj, B. (1 June 2006). "Suicide Bombing as Strategy and Interaction: The Case of the Second Intifada". Social Forces. 84 (4): 1969. doi:10.1353/sof.2006.0081. ISSN 0037-7732. S2CID 146180585. In the early years of the 21st century, Israel, the West Bank and Gaza became the region of the world with the highest frequency of - and the highest per capita death toll due to - suicide bombing.
  23. ^ Schweitzer, Y. (2010). "The rise and fall of suicide bombings in the second Intifada". Strategic Assessment. 13 (3): 39–48. As part of the violence perpetrated by the Palestinians during the second intifada, suicide bombings played a particularly prominent role and served as the primary effective weapon in the hands of the planners.
  24. ^ Schachter, J. (2010). "The End of the Second Intifada?" (PDF). Strategic Assessment. 13 (3): 63–70. Archived from the original (PDF) on 30 September 2021. This article attempts to identify the end of the second intifada by focusing on the incidence of suicide bombings, arguably the most important element of second intifada-related violence.
  25. ^ Sela-Shayovitz, R. (2007). "Suicide bombers in Israel: Their motivations, characteristics, and prior activity in terrorist organizations". International Journal of Conflict and Violence. 1 (2): 163. The period of the second Intifada significantly differs from other historical periods in Israeli history, because it has been characterized by intensive and numerous suicide attacks that have made civilian life into a battlefront.
  26. ^ "B'Tselem – Statistics – Fatalities 29.9.2000–15.1.2005". B'Tselem. Archived from the original on 14 April 2013.
  27. ^ Tucker 2019, p. 958p: he [Abbas] and Israeli prime minister Sharon agreed in an early 2005 summit to suspend hostilities. This agreement effectively ended the Second Intifada
  28. ^ Abbas 2005.
  29. ^ Sharon 2005.
  30. ^ Reinhart 2006, p. 77.