diers and policemen killed by Palestinians; 67 Palestinians killed by Israeli civilians
(many of them settlers in the territories); and 97 Israeli civilians killed by Palestinians.
More than 300 other Palestinians died at the hands of fellow Palestinians, in many
cases for allegedly collaborating with Israeli authorities, according to B’Tselem’s fig-
ures. In addition, thousands of people—most of them Palestinians—were injured dur-
ing the intifada, many of them crippled for life. The intifada also had severe economic
consequences for the Palestinians. Shops closed sometimes for days or even weeks at
a time because of demonstrations and strikes, Israeli military actions, or threats and
activities by Palestinians; fields and orchards were burned. Thousands of Palestinians
went without work or were prevented from going to their jobs.
Beyond the violence, the loss of income, and the radicalizing effect on thousands
of Palestinian youths, the intifada reshaped the basic landscape of relations between
Israelis and Palestinians as well as those between the Palestinians and influential inter-
national forces. One of the first such changes was a decision by King Hussein in June
1988 to abandon Jordan’s claim to sovereignty over the West Bank, a move that under-
cut Israel’s insistence on using Jordan as the intermediary for any diplomatic dealings
with the Palestinians. In November 1988, the PLO issued a declaration of Palestinian
“independence,” officially embracing the idea of a “two-state solution” to the conflict,
with Israel and a Palestinian state living side-by-side. In mid-December 1988 PLO
chairman Yasir Arafat for the first time renounced the use of violence against Israel,
opening the way for official contacts between the United States and the PLO. Over
the longer term, the intifada created the pressures that led Israel and the PLO to begin
secret talks in January 1993 that produced an agreement between them in September
- The ultimate failure of all these steps toward peace led to a second, more vio-
lent, intifada beginning in 2000 (Jordan Relinquishes the West Bank, p. 200; Oslo
Accords, p. 213; Camp David and the al-Aqsa Intifada, p. 276).
Following is the text of a statement by Israeli defense minister Yitzhak Rabin to the
Knesset on December 23, 1987, and the text of “Communiqué No. 3” issued by
the Palestine Liberation Organization and the United National Command of the
Uprising on January 18, 1988.DOCUMENT
Rabin on the Intifada
DECEMBER23, 1987For the past two weeks, we have been facing a continuous series of civil disorders,
exceptional in their scope, force and intensity in Judea, Samaria, [the West Bank] and
the Gaza District. At week’s end, these grave events spread to Jerusalem, and two days
ago, Israeli Arabs also joined the violent disorders. It is my hope that this was an excep-
tional event not to be repeated.
We have already experienced disturbances and terrorist attacks in the past. How-
ever, one cannot ignore the unusual severity of the events of the past two weeks—
ISRAEL AND THE PALESTINIANS 193