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DiogenesKynikos | 3 days ago
> Your own timeline does not name any massacre that happened before it began.
Huh? I've mentioned the massacres that Israeli forces carried out in the aftermath of Ariel Sharon's storming of the Temple Mount several times now.
> The US-led Mitchell Report is explicit: Sharon’s Temple Mount visit did not cause the Intifada
You cite the Mitchell Report when it agrees with you, but ignore it when it disagrees with you.
The Mitchell Report explicitly states that the PLO had no premeditated plan to unleash violence.
In fact, it says that the proximal cause of the 2nd Intifada was the massacre that Israel carried out on 29 September 2000 against Palestinian protesters. Those protests were in response to Sharon's storming of the Temple Mount.
The report says that after that massacre, neither side showed restraint, which caused the violence to escalate.
So the report that you yourself are citing as an authority turns out to agree almost 100% with what I've been telling you all along.
> Oslo did not promise a Palestinian state or rapid final withdrawal.
Actually, Oslo II lays out a very specific timeline for Israeli withdrawal, to be completed within 18 months (by mid-1996!).
More generally, the Oslo Accords were sold as a rapid path to a two-state solution. If the Accords weren't about a two-state solution, then the Palestinians were completely swindled by the Israelis.
richardfeynman|3 days ago
You opened with: the Second Intifada was sparked by Israeli massacres. Now your alleged massacre is Sept 29, the first day of the clashes after Sharon’s visit. That is not a prior massacre that precipitated anything, it is the opening confrontation itself, and you are laundering it with a loaded word.
On Oslo, you did not even mention it until your massacre story fell apart. And your Oslo summary is wrong on the text. Oslo II explicitly defers permanent-status issues (Jerusalem, settlements, borders, refugees, etc.) and excludes them from PA jurisdiction. The 18-month line is about phased interim jurisdiction, not a guaranteed state or full withdrawal. This was also obvious to everyone alive at the time and was widely reported. It's only now that people like you are attempting to rewrite history. https://www.peaceagreements.org/agreements/410/
Read the Mitchell Report you keep invoking.
- It describes Sept 29 as large demonstrations where Palestinians threw stones and Israeli police used rubber-coated bullets and live ammunition, killing 4 and injuring about 200. Calling that a massacre is absurd. It was an armed clash, premeditated and planned by the palestinians, so not only was there no massacre, but the Palestinians themselves say armed clash was premeditated and Sharon's visit was just a pretext.
- The Sharon visit did not cause the Al-Aqsa Intifada.
Source: https://www.palquest.org/en/historictext/13561/mitchell-repo...
Also, Sharon visiting a holy site under police protection is not violence. Mitchell even says holy places must be accessible to all believers. The choice to turn that into an uprising was a choice.
DiogenesKynikos|2 days ago
Those are the exact same thing. The "clashes" you're describing are Israeli forces firing live ammunition at unarmed Palestinian demonstrators in the wake of Sharon's deliberate provocation.
You pulled out the Mitchell Report as an authority on the subject, and it turns out that the Mitchell Report backs me up.
> Calling that a massacre is absurd.
Police opening up with live ammunition into a crowd of unarmed demonstrators, killing 4 and injuring 200 is not a massacre?
> but the Palestinians themselves say armed clash was premeditated and Sharon's visit was just a pretext.
No, no one said the September 29th clashes were premeditated. How would the PLO even be responsible for Israel deciding to open up with live ammunition on a crowd of unarmed Palestinian demonstrators? Did the PLO use mind control on the Israelis?
> Also, Sharon visiting a holy site under police protection is not violence. Mitchell even says holy places must be accessible to all believers.
The Mitchell Report says that Sharon's visit was a deliberate provocation. He wasn't just a random believer visiting a holy site. He was a top Israeli politician (on the verge of becoming prime minister) and a notorious general with a long career of slaughtering Palestinian civilians (including in Lebanon, where he let fascist Christian militias carry out a massacre in a Palestinian refugee camp). He stormed the holiest Muslim site in Palestine with hundreds of police officers. It was a political stunt intended to spark a reaction. One would have to be incredibly naive to think otherwise. Sharon knew that his actions would spark a massive outrage among Palestinians. Or are you claiming that Sharon had no idea what he was doing?
> The 18-month line is about phased interim jurisdiction, not a guaranteed state or full withdrawal.
No, the 18-month deadline is explicitly about full withdrawal of all Israeli forces from virtually the entire West Bank (including Area C) to specific military bases. Israel just completely reneged on that. Netanyahu has boasted about torpedoing Oslo by reneging on that specific requirement.