Palestine 5

2001 –First Year Of Intifada

The Taba summit also known as the permanent status talks at Taba between Israel and the Palestinian Authority, held from January 21 to January 27, 2001 at Taba in the Sinai peninsula, were peace talks aimed at reaching the "final status" negotiations to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The summit came closer to reaching a final settlement than any previous or subsequent peace talks yet ultimately failed to achieve its goals

The summit took place against the backdrop of the failed Camp David 2000 Summit between Prime Minister of Israel Ehud Barak and the Palestinian President Yasser Arafat, and a Palestinian Intifada that commenced against Israel. The Palestinians asserted that the visit to the Al-Aqsa Mosque by the Likud leader Ariel Sharon sparked the Al-Aqsa Intifada in September of 2000. For US President Bill Clinton, the peace diplomacy culminating at the Taba Summit was a final attempt to win an important political victory before he was to leave office and with expected changes of policy expected with the inauguration of President George W. Bush on January 20, 2001.

Abu Ali Mustafa, the General Secretary of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, is assassinated by an Israeli missile shot by an Apache helicopter through his office window in Ramallah. Abu Ali Mustafa was born in 1938, in the northern West Bank town of Arraba, the son of a farmer. In September 1999 he returned to the West Bank under a deal struck between Yasser Arafat and Israel's Prime Minister, Ehud Barak. In July 2000 he was elected as the new general secretary of the PFLP after Habash retired.

He was killed in a targeted assassination by two rockets fired from an Israeli helicopter as he sat at his desk in Ramallah on August 27, 2001. Over 50,000 mourners attended his funeral. At the time, he was the most senior Palestinian political leader to have been killed by Israel. The PFLP subsequently renamed their armed wing in the Occupied Palestinian Territories the Abu Ali Mustafa Brigades. He was succeeded as Secretary General by Ahmad Saadat.

Crown Prince Abdullah of Saudi Arabia proposed a Saudi peace initiative in March 2002 that formally changed the Arab world’s position on Israel. The proposal, endorsed by the Arab League, asked Israel to withdraw to the 1949 borders and establish an independent and sovereign state of Palestine with East Jerusalem as its capital. It stipulated that displaced refugees should either be allowed to return to their homes or be compensated for their loss of property. In return, the Arab states would consider the Arab-Israeli conflict over, sign comprehensive peace treaties with Israel, and normalize relations. The proposal was received with skepticism by Israel and had little practical effect.

13.03.2002 - U.N. Resolution 1397

The U.S. pushes through the passage of U.N. Resolution 1397 by the Security Council, demanding an "immediate cessation of all acts of violence" and "affirming a vision of a region where two states, Israel and Palestine, live side by side within secure and recognized borders".