The Grievances of the Palestinians Under the Occupation and a Popular Research Paper

The Grievances of the Palestinians Under the Occupation and a Popular National Uprising - Research Paper Example As the Intifada continued to spread and escalate, Oslo happened. The prospect of peace and the emergence of a liberated and sovereign Palestinian state, concomitant with the recognition of the PLO as the official representatives of the Palestinian people, had brought the violence to an end. As the events of 2000 were to later indicate, however, the Intifada had only been temporarily abated by the promise of peace and the prospect of Palestinian statehood and sovereignty. As it became increasingly evident, however, that Oslo was not going to be realized and as socio-political and economic conditions in the occupied territories continued to worsen, the second Intifada erupted, sparked off by the then-Defense Minister Ariel Sharon’s effective storming of Al Aqsa Mosque. The Palestinian Intifada, as may be deduced from the preceding, is a confrontational resistance to the occupation. As the Palestinians have been resisting the occupation since 1948, it is necessary to distinguish the Intifada (both first and second) from other forms of Israeli-Palestinian confrontation. In essence, as contrasted with previous cycles of contention during the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, the Palestinian Intifada may be distinguished by two central features. First its structural context: the fact that the Palestinians were a national minority under Israeli military occupation as opposed to other past structures of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict (e.g. two national movements grappling under a British mandate, 1919-1948).