In Context: Israel’s Assault on Gaza and Lebanon

MAY 26: FIVE prominent Palestinian prisoners, representing Fatah, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, and the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine, issue a National Conciliation Document calling for the creation of a Palestinian state within pre-1967 borders, alongside Israel, and asserting the right of Palestinian refugees to return to lands within Israel proper.

In the southern Lebanese city of Sidon, a car bomb kills Islamic Jihad officials Nidal and Mahmoud Majzoub. In June, Mahmoud Rafeh confessed to the killings and admitted he had been working for the Israeli Mossad since 1994.

May 29: For the first time since their September 2005 withdrawal, Israeli ground troops enter Gaza, killing four Palestinians, including a policeman.

June 5: Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas announces a June 26 referendum based on the “prisoners’ document.” Hamas opposes the referendum.

June 8: Israel assassinates four Palestinian members of the Popular Resistance Committees, including recently appointed Interior Ministry Secretary-General Jamal Abu Samhadana.

June 9: Palestinian militants fire small crude Qassam rockets into Israel toward Ashkelon, but no Israelis are hurt.

Israeli artillery shelling kills seven Palestinian civilians on a northern Gaza beach, including a family having a picnic with their three small children. In response, the Hamas government vows to end its official 16-month cease-fire with Israel.

June 10: Hamas forces fire at least 15 Qassam rockets from Gaza into Israel.

June 11: An Israeli air strike kills two Hamas commandos in Gaza. Palestinians respond with more Qassam rockets.

June 13: An Israeli missile fired into a busy Gaza City street kills 11 people, including two children and two medics.

June 14: Fatah and Hamas reach an agreement to integrate a 3,000-man militia formed by the Hamas-controlled interior ministry into the Fatah-dominated national police.

June 15: Palestinians fire Qassam rockets into the Israeli town of Sederot.

Hamas announces its willingness to reinstate the 16-month cease-fire if Israel will stop all attacks on Gaza and the West Bank. Israel refuses, demanding that the Palestinian rocket attacks stop first.

June 20: An Israeli missile kills three Palestinian children and injures 15 others in Gaza.

June 21: An Israeli airstrike kills a 35-year-old pregnant woman and her brother, and injured 11 others, including 6 children.

June 24: Israel abducts two civilians, a doctor and his brother, in Gaza.

June 25: Palestinian commandos kill two Israeli soldiers and capture Cpl. Gilad Shalit after tunneling 300 yards into Israel from Gaza. Israel closes all border crossings into Gaza.

June 26: Palestinian captors demand that Israel release all 95 Palestinian women and 313 youths under age 18 held in Israeli prisons in exchange for the release of Corporal Shalit. A total of more than 9,500 Palestinians (excluding those who are Israeli citizens) are known to be held in Israeli prisons.

Israel’s Shin Bet security officials force the cancellation of a Jerusalem news conference called by three Israeli rabbis, Hamas MP Muhamed Abu Tir and Palestinian Minister for Jerusalem Khaled Abu Arafa to launch a new peace initiative.

June 27: Fatah and Hamas adopt a common political platform, based on the “prisoners’ document,” that includes an implicit recognition of the state of Israel by Hamas.

Israeli troops and armor move in force into southern Gaza.

June 28: The Popular Resistance Committees kill an Israeli settler near Ramallah.

June 29: Israeli tanks and armored bulldozers roll into northern Gaza. Israeli aircraft bomb three bridges at Deir al-Balah and the former settlement of Netzarim and destroy Gaza’s sole power station that supplies half of Gaza’s electricity. Israel begins shelling Beit Hanoun and Beit Lahiya, and its missiles target the Islamic University in Gaza City.

Israel arrests Deputy Prime Minister Nasser Shaer, one-third of the Palestinian cabinet, including Labor Minister Mohammed Barghouti and Finance Minister Omar Abdel Razak, and 20 Palestinian legislators in Ramallah, Jenin, East Jerusalem and other parts of the West Bank. In all, 87 Palestinians are detained in the West Bank.

June 30: Israeli warplanes strike the Palestinian Interior Ministry building, setting it on fire. Meanwhile, Israeli aircraft and artillery continue to shower southern Gaza.

July 3: Israeli forces intensify their attacks on Gaza. Israeli aircraft bomb Gaza City, hitting the local Fatah party office and the offices of Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh.

July 7: Israeli Public Security Minister Avi Dichter indicates for the first time that Israel might be willing to free Palestinian prisoners in exchange for the release of Corporal Shalit.

July 8: Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh calls for a cease-fire to halt the Israeli offensive in Gaza. Israel rejects the Palestinian offer, demanding that Palestinians first return the captured Israeli soldier and halt rocket attacks into southern Israel.

July 9: The Palestinian death toll resulting from Israel’s Gaza offensive surpasses 50.

July 12: Lebanon’s Hezbollah militia engages in border skirmishes with Israeli troops. In the ensuing battle, Hezbollah forces kill three Israeli soldiers and capture two. According to initial AP and ABC-News reports, the Israeli soldiers were captured in southern Lebanon.

July 13: Israel responds with military assaults from the air, land, and sea into southern Lebanon. In the capital, Israeli warplanes bomb Beirut International Airport, the surrounding southern suburbs where Hezbollah operates, and the main highway connecting Beirut with Damascus, blocking nearly all normal means out of the country.

Hezbollah fires scores of Katyusha rockets into Israel.

Sources:

Sharat G. Lin, “Who Started It? Chronology of the Latest Crisis in the Middle East,” CounterPunch, <www.counterpunch.com>, July 25, 2006.

Arthur Nelsen, “A Way Out of the Gaza Crisis?,” CounterPunch, <www.counterpunch.com>, July 5, 2006 (see “Other Voices”).

Noam Chomsky interview with Amy Goodman on Pacifica Radio’s “Democracy Now,” <www.democracynow.org>, July 14, 2006.

George Monbiot, “Israel Responded to an Unprovoked Attack by Hezbollah, Right? Wrong,” The Guardian, Aug. 8, 2006 (see p. 12).