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P.O.V.
P.O.V.: PROMISES  by B.Z. Goldberg and Carlos Bolado
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Timeline Home1880-19361947-19731974-19881991-2001

October 1991

The Madrid Peace Conference takes place in Madrid, Spain. The conference includes delegations from Israel, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt, and the Palestinians. The Madrid conference marks the first time most of the Arab parties (except for Egypt) and Israel sat down at a table together. The conference is organized along bi-lateral [involving or participated in by two nations] lines as well as multilateral [participated in by more than two nations] lines.

January–September 1993

Secret talks between Israeli and Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) negotiators begin in Oslo, Norway. On September 13, Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat and Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin sign a Declaration of Principles in Washington on the basis of the negotiations between Israeli and Palestinian teams in Oslo, Norway.

An Israeli Perspective

Israel recognized the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and gave them limited autonomy (in the occupied territories of the West Bank and Gaza) in return for peace.

 

A Palestinian Perspective

The PLO in turn gave up its claims to Israel’s territory as defined by its borders before the 1967 war. The Palestinians also agreed to end the Intifada and establish security in the West Bank and Gaza.

The trade-offs made became known as "land for peace." Because they could not resolve all the issues right away, the two sides agreed to make gradual steps towards a final settlement of the conflict. The process by which the two sides would gradually exchange land for peace and work out the more difficult issues standing in the way of a final agreement became known as the "Oslo peace process."

What was significant about Oslo is that it ended the existential [of, relating to, or affirming existence] conflict between the Israelis and Palestinians. The two sides were no longer claiming that the other did not have the right to exist as a state or peoples on that land and both pledged to work towards a final agreement that would settle all outstanding issues between them.

1994
In February a militant Jewish settler kills 29 Palestinians praying at the main mosque in Hebron, the West Bank. In May, Israel and the PLO reach the "Cairo Agreement," which included an Israeli military withdrawal from about 60% of the Gaza Strip (Jewish settlements and their environs are excluded) and the West Bank town of Jericho. Further Israeli withdrawals were anticipated during a five year period in which a permanent resolution would be negotiated on the issues of Jerusalem, settlements, Palestinian refugees and Palestinian sovereignty.

On July 1, Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat makes a triumphal return to Gaza to take up his new position as head of the new Palestinian self-rule Authority (PA), after nearly 12 years of running the PLO from Tunisia. On October 26, a comprehensive peace treaty between Israel and Jordan is signed. The peace treaty ended the conflict between the two countries that dated back to the war of 1967, when Israel gained control of Jerusalem and the West Bank from Jordan.
1995

On September 28, Arafat and Rabin sign the Taba agreement (known as Oslo II) in Washington to expand Palestinian self-rule in the West Bank and Gaza and allow Palestinian elections (held on January 20, 1996). However, on November 4, Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin is assassinated by Yigal Amir, an orthodox Jewish student opposed to Israeli withdrawals from the occupied West Bank. Shimon Peres becomes Prime Minister of Israel.
February–March 1996
A series of Hamas suicide bomb attacks kills 57 Israelis. Shimon Peres suspends negotiations with Syria. Hamas is an Islamist political group founded in 1988 that opposes Israel and rejects the Oslo peace process and other negotiations. Hamas is not an abbreviation but a nickname, and comes from Arabic for "zeal." The full name is Harakatu Mujawamati Islamiya, or Islamic Resistance Movement.
1996
In May, Likud candidate Binyamin Netanyahu wins the election for prime minister, defeating incumbent Shimon Peres, of the Labor party. Netanyahu had campaigned against the Labor party’s approach to the peace process, promising that he would provide "Peace with Security." Yet in September, violence claims the lives of 61 Arabs and 15 Israeli soldiers over Israel’s opening of an archaeological tunnel site close to Muslim shrines in Jerusalem.
January 17, 1997
Under the leadership of Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, Israel hands over 80% of the West Bank town of Hebron to Palestinian rule, but holds on to the remainder, where several hundred Jewish settlers live among 20,000 Palestinians.
October 23, 1998
Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu signs the Wye River Memorandum outlining further Israeli withdrawals from the West Bank. The Wye River Memorandum resulted from meetings between President Bill Clinton and Netanyahu at the Wye Plantation in Maryland. The U.S. had been pressuring Israel to end 18 months of stagnation of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.
1999
On May 19, Labor Party leader Ehud Barak is elected Prime Minister of Israel, defeating Likud party incumbent Binyamin Netanyahu. Barak campaigned on a platform of bringing an end to all of Israel’s conflicts with all its neighbors, Syria, Lebanon, and the Palestinians. On September 5, 1999, Israel and the Palestinian Authority sign a revised deal based on the stalled Wye River accord, aimed at reviving the Middle East peace process. On November 8, 1999 final status talks resume between Israel and the Palestinians.
2000
In February a summit between Barak and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat breaks up over a disagreement on a promised Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank under the revised Wye accord. Final status negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians are deadlocked as the deadline for a framework agreement (basic guidelines for an eventual final agreement for peace between Palestinians and Israelis) is missed. In March, Israel hands over part of the West Bank to Palestinians as part of a land transfer agreed to at the Wye River conferences of 1998. The land amounted to 6.1% of the total of the West Bank.

On May 23, 2000, Israel unilaterally withdraws from the area of Lebanon it was occupying since 1982. And in July, a peace summit between Palestinian and Israeli leaders and negotiators at Camp David ends deadlocked over competing claims to Jerusalem and the issue of Palestinians refugees. Palestinians and Israelis accused each other of not being willing to make the compromises necessary for an agreement.

An Israeli Perspective

Israel believes its offer of handing over 95% of the West Bank and Gaza to Palestinians for the formation of a Palestinian state to be generous.

Israel views its condition of maintaining control over settlements and security zones in the West Bank to be not only reasonable but also necessary for its national security.

 

A Palestinian Perspective

Palestinians believe they should not have to accept less than 100% of the West Bank and Gaza because the total of both territories only comprises 22% of what was originally Palestine.

Palestinians also view the Israeli proposal as unacceptable because it would divide the Palestinian state into disconnected regions; a situation that would not free them from Israeli occupation and would not make for a truly independent state.

In this atmosphere of stalemate and recrimination, on September 28, 2000 Ariel Sharon, the leader of Likud (Israel’s right-wing political party), visits the Temple Mount, known to Muslims as the Haram al-Sharif (Noble Sanctuary) with 1,000 Israeli soldiers. A Palestinian protest of Sharon’s visit turns violent and sparks demonstrations and violence that have continued until today.

Sharon and his supporters state that the Palestinian violence was planned before his visit to the Temple Mount and that the Palestinians are only using his visit to the Mount as an excuse for their attacks.
The Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs has used the term "Terror Intifada" to describe the violence committed by Palestinians since September 2001.

Israelis point to Palestinian attacks on Joseph’s tomb (in West Bank town of Nablus) on October 8th, 2000 and Rachel’s tomb (in West Bank town of Bethlehem) as proof that Palestinians do not respect Jewish holy sites and therefore should not be granted sovereignty over the Temple Mount.

 

Because Jews do not normally visit the Temple Mount except as tourists and because Sharon made his visit accompanied by 1,000 soldiers during a delicate part of the peace process, Sharon has been criticized for trying to provoke a Palestinian reaction that would undermine the peace process.

Palestinians term their demonstrations and attacks the "al-Aqsa Intifada," in the name of the mosque on the Haram al-Sharif and state that the Intifada is fueled by frustration over continued Israeli occupation of the majority of the West Bank and parts of the Gaza Strip.

The Al Aqsa Intifada is significant because it marks the first time Palestinian citizens of Israel have participated in protests and demonstrations against Israel in solidarity with Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.

Israelis cite the participation of Arab Israelis in the recent Intifada as a reason not to allow Palestinian refugees to return to live in Israel.

 

Arab Israelis have stated that they are protesting the continued occupation of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip as well as the treatment of Arab Israelis within Israel. According to the Nazareth-based Arab Association for Human Rights, there are huge gaps in local government budgets for Jewish and Arab towns and municipalities.

In October, President Clinton presides over a summit between Palestinians and Israelis at the Egyptian resort of Sharm el-Sheikh. The summit attendees announce a cease-fire and plans to bring an end to the Palestinian-Israeli violence but the cease-fire comes undone soon after it is formed. With his governing coalition teetering on the edge of collapse, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak gives his resignation to the country’s president on December 10, stating that he wants to seek a new mandate from the Israeli people. In other words, he hoped to get re-elected on the platform of continuing to work towards a final peace agreement with the Palestinians, and thereby regain the authority to take the steps necessary to achieve such an agreement. Barak ran as the Labor Party’s candidate against Likud Party candidate Ariel Sharon.
February 7, 2001
Likud Party (Israel’s right wing) candidate Ariel Sharon is elected as Prime Minister of Israel, beating Ehud Barak by more than 20 percentage points. Sharon campaigned on the platform of "Peace with Security," and promised that he would take a different approach to the Palestinian conflict than the Oslo Peace Process approach. Palestinians are long-time critics of Ariel Sharon because of his role in Israel’s 1982 invasion of Lebanon, and his support of Israel’s settlement activity.
February 14, 2001

Following the deaths of eight soldiers and civilians killed when a Palestinian bus driver ploughed his vehicle into a waiting line of passengers, Israel reimposes a total blockade on the occupied territories.

 

Palestinians claim that the blockades prevent medical and humanitarian supplies from reaching Palestinians and prevent Palestinians from attending their jobs in Israel and traveling between towns in the occupied territories.

On March 7, Ariel Sharon formally takes office as Israeli prime minister, heading a fragile seven-party coalition and a government team comprising a third of the 120-member Knesset. Veteran Labor leader Shimon Peres serves as Foreign Minister, after talking his party into joining Ariel Sharon’s rightwing government of national unity. In April, Israeli troops seize territory controlled by the Palestinians for the first time since the start of the Oslo process. Israeli troops seize the Gaza Strip and divide the territory into three parts.

In May, the Mitchell Commission calls for an immediate ceasefire, to be followed by confidence building measures and ultimately by renewed peace negotiations. Mitchell also calls for a freeze on expansion of Jewish settlements in the occupied territories. Additionally, the European Union accuses Israel of using "disproportionate" force in the occupied territories and calls on it to dismantle Jewish settlements in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. In June, a suicide bomber kills 19 young Israelis at a nightclub in Tel Aviv. Yasser Arafat orders his forces in the occupied territories to enforce a ceasefire.

The next month, on July 4, 2001, the Israeli security cabinet votes to give the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) a broader license to target Palestinian terrorists. Formerly, the IDF was only permitted to assassinate terrorists actually on their way to committing an attack. The new guidelines allow the IDF to act against known terrorists even if they are not on the verge of committing an attack.

Israel has stated that it must undertake preventive action against imminent terrorist threats and that in the small minority of cases where arrests are impossible (mostly due to the lack of Israeli jurisdiction in PA areas), it is forced to carry out other types of preventative operations it terms "active self-defense."

Israel states that international law in general, and the law of armed conflict in particular, recognize that individuals who directly take part in hostilities cannot claim immunity from attack or protection as innocent civilians. Israel states that it only acts in a manner that is in compliance with the principles and practice of armed conflict, and makes every effort to avoid involvement of innocent civilians.

 

Palestinians have taken issue with Israel’s policy of "targeted assassinations," stating that these killings constitute extra-judicial executions, where the victims have been killed without trial and without the chance of a fair legal process designed to examine the allegations brought forward against them.

Palestinians state that under the Fourth Geneva Convention, Israel as the Occupying Power has the right to arrest and bring to trial those suspected of violent hostile activities. However, under the same Convention, extra-judicial executions are willful killings, which constitute war crimes and are subject to universal jurisdiction.

On August 10th, in retaliation for a Jerusalem suicide bombing on the previous day, Israeli warplanes fire missiles at and level the headquarters of the Palestinian police in the West Bank city of Ramallah. The militant Islamist group Hamas claimed responsibility for the bombing. Israeli Special Forces also seize the offices of the Palestine Liberation Organization at Orient House in East Jerusalem. Several days later, Israeli tanks move into the West Bank city of Jenin and open fire on the Palestinian police station, destroying it. This is the biggest incursion into Palestinian-controlled territory since 1994. The move is strongly criticized by Washington, which is coming under increasing international pressure to step up its intermediary role in the region. Nevertheless, on August 28, 2001 Israeli troops move into the West Bank town of Beit Jala, near the southern outskirts of Jerusalem. The U.S. and Britain strongly condemn the Israeli action. Throughout the late Summer and Fall Israel occupies major Palestinian cities for various lengths of time, including Jerico, Ramallah and Tulkarm.

Though the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has escalated since the October 17th, 2001 assassination of the Israeli hard-line Tourism Minister Rehavam Zeevi by Palestinian militants, there are positive signs of a renewed interest in peace talks. In a speech to the United Nations on November 15th, Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres spoke of Israeli support for Palestinian independence and a Palestinian state.

Since the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, D.C. of September 11th, the Bush administration has shown more of an interest in bringing Israel and the Palestinians to negotiations, greatly in response to requests from Arab and Muslim governments that are supporting the U.S. war against terrorism. On October 2, Bush announced a dramatic break with his administration’s previous Middle East policy by stating that he is prepared to back the creation of a Palestinian state and U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell is expected to outline a new American initiative for restoring negotiations between Israel and Palestine.

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