The Third Intifada

The first Intifada began in a Gaza refugee camp in 1987 and quickly spread to the rest of the Occupied Territories.  A provocative walk on Jerusalem’s Temple Mount in 2000 by then-Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon sparked the second one, which, like its bloody predecessor, lasted six years.  A third and potentially even more catastrophic Intifada is brewing.

Israeli-Palestinian violence is common but Palestinians living in East Jerusalem are rarely its perpetrators.  Of the 179 suicide attacks in the Occupied Territories and Jerusalem since 2000, not one was carried out by a Jerusalem ID holder.  In the same time frame, 270 East Jerusalemites were arrested on terrorism charges, less than the monthly average in the West Bank.  However, this year’s total arrests number 71.  More ominous still, East Jerusalemites carried out three serious attacks in the past five months.  The first occurred in March when a gunman killed eight students at an orthodox yeshiva; the next two in June and July when construction workers used bulldozers to attacks cars, killing three and injuring 30.  Israeli authorities also recently arrested four East Jerusalemites on suspicion of trying to form an Al-Qaeda cell.  These events have caused alarm.  Former Israeli Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz, who currently holds the transport portfolio, warned that Jerusalem was becoming a “terror hub,” while President Mahmoud Abbas’ advisor on Jerusalem has characterized the situation as combustible.  

The concerns are real.  About 250,000 Palestinians live in East Jerusalem, or 34 percent of the entire city’s population, many in poor conditions.  Two-thirds live below the poverty line and half their homes are not connected to the water network.  Overcrowding is acute.  Refusal by Israel to issue building permits to Palestinians coupled with a colonial-like policy of building Israeli settlements in the eastern portion of the city—20,000 new homes since 2000—exacerbates tensions, as does the separation barrier that has cut East Jerusalem off from the West Bank since 2004.

The lack of avenues for political expression for Palestinians in Jerusalem also breeds discontent.  The Palestinian’s refusal of Israeli citizenship and boycotting of municipal elections have compounded their political isolation, as has the Israeli policy of shutting down the principal civil society and cultural institutions in East Jerusalem (note: as “permanent residents” of Israel, Palestinians in East Jerusalem have certain rights, including the right to live and work in the country without permit and the right to vote in local elections).  Such circumstances partially explain why Palestinians in Jerusalem, like those in the West Bank and Gaza, have experienced “Hamasization,” with support for the radical political party growing, and, according to some, religious observance increasing.

An East Jerusalem Intifada would be devastating.  If Jerusalem is indivisible and fully part of Israel, then free access to West Jerusalem, and, indeed, to all of Israel, by East Jerusalemites renders the country highly vulnerable to attack.  But to mention partitioning the city as part of broader peace agreement is, at present, untenable— Shas, the ultra-Orthodox party and pivotal government coalition member, has threatened to leave if negotiations over Jerusalem ensue.  And so benign neglect prevails.  Yet, as previous Intifadas demonstrate, and as all experience in the region demonstrates, neglect in the Middle East is never benign.