Assassination

Abstract

Within months the Oslo agreements began to deteriorate. At the end of October 1993, Muslim terrorists belonging for the most part to the Hamas and Islamic Jihad movements attacked and killed a number of soldiers, settlers, and other Israeli civilians. Triggered by one especially brutal slaying, the burning alive of a settler, a “Jewish intifada,” a mini-insurrection of the settlers, broke out. There were some killings, but it mainly took the form of attacks on hundreds of Arab cars and other property in Arab villages. When the settlers learned that the slaying was actually carried out by members of Arafat’s Fatah movement (the dominant group within the PLO, albeit one unable to control other groups within the organization), they turned their wrath on the Rabin administration. The Israeli government retaliated with the establishment of military checkpoints on the roads out of the two Palestinian areas, limiting the movement of people and goods. Intended as a security measure, especially after Hamas resorted to suicide bombers, they were perceived as sources of humiliation and made life miserable for ordinary Palestinians.