The Palestine Chronology

Quartet officials open 2 days of meetings in Israel and Ramallah aimed at reviving peace talks. Palestinian advocacy groups note “a growing disconnect between the Quartet talks and the situation on the ground.” (NYT 12/14)

Jewish settlers take over several abandoned churches in a closed military zone nr. the Jordanian border to protest Jordan’s efforts to intervene with the Israeli government over its 12/12 closure of a footbridge used by nonMuslims to reach the Haram al-Sharif/ Temple Mount; IDF troops remove them and arrest 17. Other settlers block a main West Bank road and stone passing Palestinian vehicles. Later, about 50 Jewish settlers with inside information of IDF plans to remove the Mitzpe Yitzhar settlement outpost nr. Nablus that evening attempt to prevent the evacuation by breaking into an IDF base in the West Bank, setting fires, vandalizing vehicles, clashing with troops, and stoning a senior officer; troops detain 2. PM Netanyahu vows to “act aggressively against those harming Israeli soldiers and their commanders”; DM Ehud Barak condemns both incidents as “home-grown terror.” Late at night, Jewish settler youths enter Nablus to pray at Joseph’s Tomb, but they do so without the usual coordination with and escort of the IDF and deface a mosque. Meanwhile, IDF troops make a brief incursion into c. Gaza to level land and clear lines of sight along the border fence e. of Bureij r.c., firing on surrounding areas to keep Palestinians away, wounding a farmer working his field nearby. IDF troops on the n. Gaza border fire warning shots at Palestinian and international activists staging a nonviolent protest march to the border nr. Bayt Hanun to protests Israel’s imposition of a no-go zone, causing no injuries; also fire warning shots at Palestinians scavenging for construction material in the demolished Erez industrial zone, wounding a 14-yr.-old boy. In the West Bank, the IDF makes a latenight raid on the home of Change and Reform PC mbr. Ayman Daraghmeh, arresting him (making him the 24th Hamas-affiliated PC mbr. now in detention); conducts late-night arrest raids, house searches nr. Salfit. (NYT, WP, WT 12/14; PCHR 12/15; OCHA 12/16; JPI 12/23)

The PA Tourism Min. launches a campaign in Bethlehem coinciding with Christmas called “Palestine Celebrating Hope.” Tourism M Kholoud Daibes says the intention is to convey to the estimated 50,000 foreigners visiting Bethlehem for Christmas “that we have hope of having our own independent state, and we need international support for that.” The initiative includes special tours of the separation wall around Bethlehem and free postcards of the Church of the Nativity, which tourists can mail at the Manger Square post office with Palestinian stamps. (WT 12/14)

IDF troops on the n. Gaza border fire on Palestinians scavenging material from destroyed buildings 400 m fr. the border, forcing them to flee; no injuries are reported. Shortly after, the same IDF unit shells the area where the Palestinians had been scavenging as well as a Palestinian home in Bayt Lahiya, causing damage but no injuries. In the West Bank, the IDF patrols in Bayt Rima nr. Ramallah during the day; conducts late-night arrest raids, house searches nr. Hebron. Some 50 Jewish settlers break into the ancient Na’aran synagogue in Palestinian-controlled area A in Jericho to hold religious services, declaring their hopes of “renewing Jewish settlement in Jericho”; the IDF removes the settlers, arresting at least 35. Jewish settlers escorted by IDF troops enter Kafr Haris village n. of Salfit to perform Jewish prayers at monuments in the village. (HA 2/22; PCHR 2/24; OCHA 2/25)

Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu adds 2 key West Bank Jewish shrines, the Tomb of the Patriarchs (known as alIbrahimi Mosque to Palestinians) in the center of Hebron and Rachel’s Tomb just inside Bethlehem, to Israel’s national heritage sites, allocating $1 m. for their maintenance and repair as part of a $100 m. project to refurbish and link 150 national heritage sites, creating a “historical biblical trail [to] educate the next generation about Jewish and Zionist history.” The PA condemns the action. (IFM 2/21; PCHR, WT 2/22; NYT 2/23; JPI 3/4)

International diplomacy to end OCL clicks into gear with France proposing that Israel and Hamas impose a 48-hr. humanitarian truce to try to defuse the violence and restore the Gaza cease-fire, with humanitarian groups, Egypt, the EU, the Quartet, and the U.S. opening mediation channels (see Quarterly Update). Israel’s security cabinet meets to discuss the French proposal but does not formally respond.

Israeli actions: The IDF conducts 70 air strikes on Gaza, while the Israeli navy continues shelling from the sea, killing at least 10 Palestinians and wounding 40, bringing the death toll to about 370. The IDF reports hitting 110 individual sites, with primary targets being tunnels on the Rafah border, suspected weapons factories and rocket-launching sites, civil and naval police stations, and groups of resistance mbrs. In Gaza City, at least 20 air strikes hit Haniyeh’s offices, PA Interior Min., and main PA government complex in Gaza City, all of which had been targeted previously; 1 air strike hits an ambulance, killing 1 paramedic, seriously wounding a doctor and the driver. Part of Gaza’s main power grid is also hit, cutting all power to Gaza City. A fuel depot in Rafah is destroyed. In al-Bureij r.c., a mosque and health clinic are hit. In Khan Yunis, a money exchange is destroyed. At least 7 homes across the Strip are targeted. Target locations include Abasan, Bayt Hanun, Bayt Lahiya, al-Bureij r.c., Dayr al-Balah, Gaza City, Jabaliya town and r.c., Khan Yunis, al-Maghazi (c. Gaza), al-Mughraqa, al-Qarara, Rafah. The IDF launches a YouTube channel to broadcast declassified videos of its operations in Gaza, “other footage of interest to the international community” (JPI 1/8) and begins regular briefings for Internet bloggers worldwide.

Palestinian actions: Palestinians fire 41 rockets, 10 mortars into Israel, damaging 1 home in Sederot and causing several light injuries (excluding shock); 1 rocket lands in Beersheba, 25 mi. fr. the Gaza border, marking the farthest strike to date; 2 other long-range rockets land in Ashdod. Humanitarian notes: Israel allows 93 trucks into Gaza (50 carrying medical supplies and food donated by aid groups; 43 carrying commercial goods), but Gaza City’s Shifa Hospital says it is out of 150 kinds of medicine and 230 other medical supplies, including gloves, scissors, sterilization equipment, nitrogen for anesthesia. Fuel shipments are still cut off; Gaza’s power plant shuts down for lack of fuel. (BBC, HA, Independent 12/30; IDF, IFM, NYT, REU, UNOSAT, WP, WT 12/31; JP, PCHR 1/1; ITV 1/2; IDF 1/3; WP 1/4; IFM 1/8; NYT 1/13)

In the West Bank, a Palestinian worker in Mod’in Ilit settlement, angry over Israel’s war on Gaza, stabs, wounds 4 Jewish settlers before being shot and wounded by a paramedic who arrives on the scene. The IDF fires live ammunition, rubber-coated steel bullets, percussion grenades, tear gas at Palestinians demonstrating against OCL in al-Fawar r.c. nr. Hebron, wounding 3 (including teenagers ages 13, 14); makes simultaneous afternoon incursions into Beita and Hawara villages nr. Nablus, imposing curfews through 12/31; conducts simultaneous late-night raids, house searches on 4 villages nr. Jenin, firing on residential areas in all cases, causing no injuries and arresting only 1 teenager; conducts late-night arrest raids, house searches in Abu Dis and Jalazun r.c. nr. Ramallah, and nr. Bethlehem, Hebron, Jenin, Nablus, Tulkarm. (PCHR, WJW 1/1)

After early morning consultations with senior cabinet mbrs., the IDF launches its major offensive on Gaza, Operation Cast Lead (OCL), at 11:25 A.M. local time (4:25 A.M. EST). Israeli DM Barak acknowledges (WP 12/28) that OCL has been planned for several months, stating that the aim is “to strike Hamas severely so as to change the situation from its base,” cautioning that “it won’t be short.”

Israeli actions: After an initial “shock and awe campaign” lasting 3 min. and 40 sec., with 64 warplanes hitting more than 50 targets across the Strip, the IDF conducts periodic air strikes throughout the day, recording a total of 170 sorties against 150 targets, killing at least 228 Palestinians, wounding more than 700 (140 seriously), marking the highest single-day death toll and Israel’s largest offensive in the territories since 1967. The midday timing of the initial onslaught, just as schools let out for lunch, increases the number of civilian casualties, including an estimated 25 women and children. Israeli Military Intelligence sends automated calls to 20,000 Palestinians across the Strip warning of further air strikes targeting anyone with weapons or guns.

Targets struck are primarily civil police stations, military training bases, Hamas-related command-and-control centers, suspected weapons depots, and sites believed to manufacture rockets. Target areas include Bayt Hanun, Bayt Lahiya, al-Bureij r.c., Dayr al-Balah, Gaza City (the city center and al-Daraj, al-Shuja‘iyya, Tal al-Hawa, alTuffah, al-Zaytun neighborhoods), Jabaliya r.c., Khan Yunis, al-Mughraqa (s. of Gaza City), Rafah, Shati’ r.c., and al-Zahra’ (c. Gaza nr. Jabaliya).

Palestinian actions: Palestinians fire 59 rockets (including some that reach the farthest north to date), 19 mortars into Israel during the day, killing 1 Israeli civilian in Netivot, wounding 4. (The fatality may have occurred before the official launch of OCL.)

Humanitarian notes: Gaza’s hospitals report (BBC 12/27) overflowing wards and not enough surgeons or supplies to cope. Egypt temporarily opens the Rafah crossing to allow transportation of some wounded to Egyptian hospitals.

Of note: During the initial “shock and awe,” the IDF hits a police academy graduation ceremony in Gaza City, killing at least 60 new civil police recruits and the chief of Palestinian police Maj. Gen. Tawfiq Jabber. Other targets include Gaza City’s main jail (the Saraya, holding Hamas opponents, hitting only the gates), the PA Preventive Security headquarters in Gaza City, the PA security compound in Rafah (southern headquarters of the PASF, PA Internal Security Service, and PA civil police), PA naval police facilities in n. Gaza and Khan Yunis, Palestinian Telecommunication Company offices in n. Gaza, a Gaza City mosque identified by the IDF as “a base for terrorist activities,” Hamas’s al-Aqsa TV station, the agriculture control dept. in Khan Yunis, numerous police stations and training sites, at least 9 homes, several workshops (considered rocket-manufacturing sites), and Hamas’s Asda’ media center outside Khan Yunis. One IDF airstrike on a PA ministry building kills 8 Palestinian students at an adjacent UNRWA training center, wounding 19 others (8 seriously). Hamas and Palestinian human rights groups in Gaza estimate that the dead include around 165 civil police officers (including those at the graduation ceremony) and Hamas’s central district governor, Abu Ahmad Ashur. Some targets are hit with U.S.-supplied GBU-39 bunkerbusting munitions received as recently as 9/08 (see Quarterly Update in JPS 150 and the “Israeli Arsenal” document in this issue’s Special Focus section). (al-Arabiyya TV, BBC, HA, IDF, JAZ, Middle East News Agency [Cairo], Palestine News Agency, YA 12/27; AFP, AP, BBC, HA, IFM, JAZ, NYT, Radikal, REU, WP, WT, XIN 12/28; JP, NYT, Zaman [Ankara] 12/29; PCHR 1/1; BBC 12/30; UNOSAT 12/31; JP, WJW 1/1; WP 1/4; Eurasia Daily Monitor [online], NYT, UNOSAT 1/5; IFM, JPI 1/8; NYT 1/11)

In other Israeli-Palestinian violence, the IDF fires tear gas, percussion grenades, rubber-coated steel bullets to disperse Palestinians demonstrating against OCL in the East Jerusalem suburbs of Anata, Issawiyya, Shu‘fat r.c. An E. Jerusalem Palestinian, reportedly angry over events in Gaza, injures an Israeli border police officer in a deliberate hit and run in the city. The IDF also conducts late-night arrest raids, house searches nr. Bethlehem, Jenin. (HA 12/28; PCHR, WJW 1/1)

The IDF sends troops into Rafah to search for smugglers’ tunnels, completely demolishes 22 Palestinian homes, a mosque along the Rafah border with Egypt, heavily damages another 16 homes, leaving 400 Palestinians homeless; raids 2 Palestinian charities in Ramallah, confiscating computers, files; fires stun grenades, tear gas into a high school in Nablus; fires on residential areas of Rafah, wounding 3. The IDF also expels a West Bank Palestinian administrative detainee to Gaza; conducts arrest raids, house searches in and around Askar r.c., Bethlehem, Hebron, Nablus, Salfit, Ramallah; bulldozes 5 dunams of land in Bayt Lahia, 2 dunams nr. Kefar Darom; arrests 4 herders nr. Bayt Hanun. IDF soldiers scuffle with Jewish settlers who protest the removal of a synagogue built by supporters of deceased right-wing Rabbi Meir Kahane, the only permanent structure at the unauthorized settlement outpost of West Tapuach; soldiers do not attempt to remove trailer homes at the site. Palestinians fire 3 mortars at a Jewish settlement in Gaza, causing no damage or injuries. (AP, HA, MM, PCHR, PRCS 1/20; NYT, PR, WP 1/21; LAW, MM, PCHR 1/22; JPI 1/30)

Israel retaliates for Hizballah’s 1/19 shelling of an IDF bulldozer inside s. Lebanon by sending warplanes to strike Hizballah targets in s. Lebanon. In Washington, U.S. Secy. of State Colin Powell accuses Hizballah of deliberately taking action to escalate hostilities with Israel. (HA 1/20; LBC, MNR 1/20 in WNC 1/22; NYT, PR, WP, WT 1/21; WJW 1/22; MNR 1/22 in WNC 1/24)

A Hamas suicide bomber fr. Hebron detonates a device on a bus in Haifa, killing 14 Israelis, 1 American, wounding 40; Israel seals the West Bank and Gaza borders until further notice, vows to respond “but not [on] a scale that would disrupt any U.S. preparations for a possible attack on Iraq.” Overnight, Palestinians also reportedly fire 13 antitank missiles and grenades at IDF forces on the Rafah border, causing no damage or injuries. The IDF demolishes 1 Palestinian home in Nablus, 1 in Qalqilya, a mosque in Rafah r.c. that had been heavily damaged in earlier attacks; conducts arrest raids in Bethlehem, Qalqilya (targeting Fatah), Ramallah (nabbing senior Izzeddin al-Qassam Brigades mbr. Abdallah Barghouti), Yamun; fires on residential areas of Khan Yunis. Late in the evening, the IDF launches a major raid into Jabaliya r.c., sending in 50 tanks and helicopters, firing several missiles, killing 3 Palestinians, wounding 11; fatally shoots Islamic Jihad mbr. Muhammad al-‘Asas in an exchange of gunfire in Bethlehem, leaving 1 IDF soldier wounded. A Jerusalem court sentences Israeli Arab Murad Ajluni to life plus 20 yrs. for taking part in a 3/02 AMB shooting in Tel Aviv that left 3 Israelis dead. (HA 3/5; Interfax, VOI 3/5 in WNC 3/6; HA, MM, NYT, PCHR, WP, WT 3/6; MA 3/6 in WNC 3/7; HA 3/7; LAW, PR 3/13; PCHR 3/13; JPI 3/14)