The First Intifada - Brendan, Chandu, Jun-Ha

1. In 1987, the Palestinians rebelled against the Israelis who were controlling them and their land through military occupation. This was called the First Intifada, which lasted for 6 years. They rebelled with general civil disobedience, boycotts of Israeli products, general strikes, graffiti, and barricades. The youths also rebelled by throwing stones at Israeli Defence Forces, resulting in fatalities as soldiers panicked and fired at the young rebel. This then grew more serious, as the youths retaliated with Molotov cocktails.

2. The American Revolution was started in order to get rid of British colonial power in America. The Palestinian uprising was spontaneously started to reject Israeli occupation. There were similarities and differences between these two revolutions. Unlike the American Revolution the Palestinian uprising was started spontaneously then became a more organized Revolution while the American Revolution was more organized and formal from the beginning. The American Revolution was started to get rid of colonial rule in America while the First Intifada was to get rid of a neighbouring country (Israel) which was occupying them. They were both violent although the First Intifada had lower causalities. Both these revolutions had civilians participating in the fight. In the First Intifada, soldiers were attacked by citizens with rocks, Molotov cocktails and handguns. In the American Revolution the Minute Men were a militia who fought against British soldiers.  

3. The, term revolution is not the proper way it could be called. We could say that the outcome of the revolution was a success, but at a high cost. It was shown that the Palestinian people were very violent with around a thousand deaths. Even so, Israel was successful in containing the uprising. This happened due to the inferior force in relation to the superiorly trained Israeli Defense Forces. Even so, during the Intifada there were heavy economy blows against Israel. This resulted in the country loosing $650 million in exports. Also, Israeli tourist industry went terrible as it was important for the Israelis. Then again, this revolution lead to the September 1993 Oslo Accords. The agreement stated that Palestinians were allowed for Palestinian self-rule to most of the Palestinian towns and refugee camps in the West Bank.

 

4. Our group believes this revolution was well justified, the Israelis had no right to control the Palestinians or their land. Their methods were cruel, as you read in the first paragraph, but they were one of few options available to them. People Power and other peaceful protests wouldn’t have been effective. The best option would have been to wait for the United Nations and/or the African Summit to intervene, after they dealt with the First Persian Gulf War (Iran-Iraq), instead of fighting back using the same if not more cruel methods.

 

5. The First Intifada somewhat follows Crane Brinton’s Stages of a Revolution. The reasoning behind this is obvious. The First Intifada was a series of violent fights between the Israeli Defense Forces and the Palestinians. The Intifada basically started because the Palestinians to be governed by their people, not the Israelis. For example, stages 1 or symptoms happened as the Palestinians displayed their anger to the Israelis. However, as the STR states, the government or the Israeli people were effective in holding back the people. Stages two is the rising fever. In stage two, we can see that the Intifada is not related to it at all. Although Palestinian people now run the camp, they are only called as a rebel against the Israeli people. In phrase three however, the Intifada somewhat continues to follow the course of Brinton Crane’s revolution. We can see that the revolution is rather fragile (The Palestinian’s rebel) and that they even kill their own kind if they see a sense of betrayal with the Israelis. This also relates to the violence from the people. Finally, the revolution leads to stage four or convalescence. Apparently, we can see that the Palestinian revolution did not come to recovery or to a new government. However, a peace treaty was signed by the Israelis and the Palestinians which stated that the Palestinians had the right to govern the camp which had their own kinsmen. Apparently, this lead to stopping the violence between the Israelis and the Palestinians. To sum up, I would say that the revolution would both fit, and not fit in with Brinton’s Cranes anatomy of a revolution.

 

//encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_761579974/Intifada.html

//www.palestinefacts.org/pf_1991to_now_intifada_nature.php

//www.palestinefacts.org/pf_1967to1991_intifada_1987.php

//www.jerusalemites.org/Intifada/first.htm

//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Intifada