By Soha Abdelaty 29 September 2000 The Intifada breaks out, after Likud opposition leader Ariel Sharon visits the Haram Al-Sharif compound, which hosts Al-Aqsa Mosque. 31 September 2000 The image of 12-year-old Mohamed Al-Durrah, being killed by Israeli soldiers in his father's arms, becomes the front-view of the Intifada. 16 October 2000 A summit brokered by US President Bill Clinton between PA leader Yasser Arafat and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak fails to advance the faltering peace process. 6 February 2001 Likud takes over the reins of power, under the leadership of Ariel Sharon, after Labour leader Ehud Barak loses at an early election. 21 May 2001 Former US Senator George Mitchell, who was dispatched to the Occupied Territories to bring the two sides back to the negotiations table, issues a report recommending confidence-building measures, including the ceasing of all settlement building in the occupied territories. The Mitchell Recommendations are rejected by Israel. 13 June 2001 Another attempt at a ceasefire is made by CIA Director George Tenet. In a return for a Palestinian pledge to clamp down on "terrorists", Israel agrees to withdraw from the territory it seized since the start of the Intifada. 2 October 2001 President George Bush becomes the first US president to accept in a formal speech the creation of an independent Palestinian state. 17 October 2001 Israeli Tourism Minister Rehavam Zeevi is assassinated by the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. 16 December 2001 PA leader Yasser Arafat makes the first official call for an end to all suicide bombings. 26 February 2002 Crown Prince Abdullah of Saudi Arabia issues an initiative calling for the normalisation of all Arab ties with Israel in return for Israeli recognition of a Palestinian state based on the 1967 borders, with East Jerusalem as its capital. 12 March 2002 The Security Council endorses a resolution recognising for the first time an independent Palestinian state based on the 1967 borders with East Jerusalem as its capital. 13 March 2002 A foreign journalist, Raffaelo Ciriello, is killed by Israeli machine-gun fire, the first since the start of the Intifada. 27-28 March 2002 The Arab League summit meetings endorse the Saudi peace initiative. Egyptian and Jordanian leaders do not attend. Israel imposes a travel ban on Arafat, preventing him from attending the summit. 29 March 2002 On the heel of the Arab summit, Israel launches a "long and complicated war that knows no borders" according to Sharon. Israeli tanks and bulldozers surround Arafat's headquarters and confine him to his buildings. A five-day assault targets the Church of Nativity in Bethlehem which Israel claims is harbouring terrorists, as well as Rafah and Jenin refugee camps. Calls by the US for Israeli withdrawal from West Bank cities are ignored by Sharon. 15 April 2002 Marwan Barghouti, the driving force of the Intifada, is captured by Israeli forces in Ramallah. 25 April 2002 Arafat agrees to put on trial the four men responsible for the death of the Israeli tourism minister in return for the end of the siege placed upon him. The four men and two additional prisoners who took shelter in Arafat's compound are later transferred to joint US and UK custody. 9 May 2002 A deal ending the siege of the Church of Nativity is reached, when the fighters in the church agree to exile in several countries. 16 March 2003 Twenty-three-year old peace activist Rachel Corrie is bulldozed to death in Gaza. 30 April 2003 The US publishes a peace plan, which came to be known as the roadmap, after PA leader Yasser Arafat is pressured into appointing Mahmoud Abbas as prime minister. Abbas' cabinet is sworn in. 4 June 2003 US President George Bush comes to the region to throw his weight behind the roadmap. A summit convening Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and brokered by the US president is held in Aqaba, Jordan. The next day, Bush flies to Red Sea resort Sharm El-Sheikh for a US-Arab summit, bringing together the leaders of Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Palestine. 29 June 2003 A three-month ceasefire is agreed upon by Hamas, Islamic Jihad and Fatah. 21 August 2003 The ceasefire is called off after Israel assassinates Hamas political leader Ismail Abu Shanab. 6 September 2003 Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas resigns after a power struggle with Arafat. 15 October 2003 A US embassy convoy is attacked by Palestinians while travelling through Gaza, resulting in the death of three American security guards and the injuring of a diplomat. 21 October 2003 The UN General Assembly passes a resolution declaring Israel's separation wall on occupied territory in "contravention of international law" and demands that it halts the present building and reverse those sections already built. 12 November 2003 A new Palestinian cabinet is signed in, after Egypt interferes to resolve a dispute between newly appointed Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qurei and PA leader Yasser Arafat. 18 November 2003 The European Union issues a formal condemnation of Israel's separation wall. 1 December 2003 Left-wing Israeli politicians and Palestinian leaders put forward a peace proposal in Geneva. In return for a Palestinian agreement to renounce the right of return and to share sovereignty in East Jerusalem, including the Old City, the Israelis would withdraw from most of the Palestinian territories occupied in 1967 and evacuate 115,000 settlers out of the 400,000 who currently reside there. The proposal is met with scepticism by Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon. 22 December 2003 Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Maher is attacked by Palestinians at Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem during a one-day trip to Israel to push peace efforts forward. 2 February 2004 Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon launches what becomes known as the disengagement plan, whereby Israel would unilaterally withdraw from all Israeli settlements in Gaza, whether or not a peace agreement with the Palestinian side is reached. 2 May 2004 Sharon's Likud Party rejects his unilateral disengagement plan, despite US backing of the plan. 18 May 2004 Israel launches operation "Rainbow in the Cloud" to root out the remaining Palestinian fighters and resistance leaders taking refuge in the Rafah refugee camp, and to shut down tunnels it claims Palestinian militants have used to smuggle weapons under the Egyptian border and into Gaza. 21 Palestinians were killed and over 40 wounded, most of whom were civilians. There were no reported Israeli casualties. It is recognised as Israel's most massive incursion into Gaza since 1967 and one of the highest death tolls in a single day since the start of the Intifada in 2000. 20 May 2004 A Tel Aviv district court finds Intifada leader Marwan Barghouti guilty of murder in several attacks in 2001 and 2002. 1 July 2004 The Israeli Supreme Court finds Israel's seperation wall in violation the human rights of the Palestinian people. 10 July 2004 After the United Nations General Assembly asks the International Court of Justice to give an advisory opinion on the legality of the Israeli Seperation Wall, the court deems the wall to be illegal and urges Israel to dismantle it. 15 August 2004 Approximately 1,600 Palestinian prisoners declare a hunger strike in protest of Israeli prison conditions. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Facts and figures: September 2000- 2004 Total Number of Palestinians Killed: 3,500 Targeted assassinations: 308 Minors (under 18) : 772 Palestinians injured: 52,500 Palestinian detainees: 28,000 Palestinian homes demolished by Israel: 4,500 Trees uprooted by Israel: 1 million Total Number of Israelis Killed: 919 * Civilians : 635 * Israeli occupation forces (IOF) : 284 Israelis injured: 6,709 * Civilians: 4,711 * Minors (under 18): 110 * IOF : 1,998 Sources: Palestinian Centre for Human Rights; B'Tselem; Palestinian Red Crescent; Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Highlights: Targeted Assassinations 27 August 2001 Secretary-General of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) Abu Ali Mustafa is blasted in his office in the suburbs of Al-Bireh. 22 July 2002 A pre-dawn air strike targets a densely populated Gaza neighbourhood, killing one of Hamas' top military leaders, Salah Shehadeh, and 14 civilians, including nine children. 8 March 2003 Hamas political leader Ibrahim Al-Makadmeh and three aides are killed in downtown Gaza when Israeli helicopter gunships fire at the car the four men were travelling in. 21 August 2003 A unilateral Palestinian ceasefire comes to an end after Israel targets moderate Hamas spokesman Ismail Abu Shanab in Gaza. 10 September 2003 In the densely populated residential area of Rimal in Gaza, a senior Hamas leader, Mahmoud Zahar, is wounded, and his son and bodyguard are killed. 22 March 2004 Israel surprises the world with its assassination of Hamas' spiritual leader and founder, the aged and crippled Ahmed Yassin. 17 April 2004 Less than a month after the death of Yassin, Israel targets Abdel-Aziz Al-Rantissi, Hamas' second man. 26 September 2004 Israel takes its operations outisde the Occupied Territories and assasinates Hamas leader Izz Eldine Khalil in Damascus. Total 308 Suicide Operations 20 November 2000 Two Israelis are killed, and nine others injured as a result of a Palestinian attack on an Israeli school bus in Gaza. Israel retaliates with a fierce bombardment of Gaza, as a result of which Egypt recalls its ambassador from Tel Aviv. 1 June 2001 A bomb outside a disco near Tel Aviv's Dolphinarium results in the death of 21 Israelis and leaves 120 wounded. PA leader Yasser Arafat calls for a ceasefire. 9 August 2001 Hamas claims responsibility for a bombing in a crowded pizza restaurant in central Jerusalem which kills 15 people and wounds about 130. 27 January 2002 A 20-year-old Palestinian girl becomes the first female suicide bomber, leading to the death of one woman and wounding 100 others in central Jerusalem. 18 September 2002 A six-week ceasefire is broken by a suicide operation near an Arab town in northern Israel, claimed by Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades. 30 April 2003 Hamas and Al-Aqsa claim joint responsibility for an operation in a bar near Tel Aviv. The two men involved in the operation -- who escape unharmed -- are said to be British. 31 August 2004 Two parallel suicide bombings take place on two Beersheba city buses, killing 16 people and wounding 100. Total 119 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Compiled by Soha Abdelyaty
