The event that entered history as the “May War,” and that the Palestiniansrefer to as the “Harb El Istiklal,” began on May 14, 1999 — 51 years tothe day after Ben-Gurion declared the founding of the State of Israel.
In the Al-Shawah hall in Gaza, Yasser Arafat declared theestablishment of the State of Palestine. The declaration, verysimilar to Israel’s Declaration of Independence, was based onhistory as well as on U.N. Resolutions, and included the promise ofdemocracy, equal rights for all “without regard to race, religionor language,” and “extending its hand in peace to Israel.”
Arafat announced that the Palestinian police forces have become the”National Palestinian Army” and declared a general mobilization ofFatah members..
Within 24 hours, 121 countries granted the Palestinian state “de jure”recognition. 61 countries, among them the majority of European states,granted it “de facto” recognition. Only Micronesia, the U.S. and Israelrefrained from recognizing the new state.
24 hours later, the Netanyahu government announced theannexation of 51% of the West Bank, 31% of the Gaza Strip, as wellas all of the settlements currently existing as enclaves withinPalestinian territory, to israel.
All of the Palestinian opposition factions declared their unequivocalsupport for Arafat, with Hamas and Islamic Jihad forces submitting to thePalestinian Armed Forces’ command.
Opinions regarding the causes of the war are contradictory. ThePalestinian version claims that residents of Kiryat Arbasettlement opened fire on the Palestinian army near the BaruchGoldstein tomb. According to Netanyahu’s version, it wasthe Palestinians who opened fire on the Hebron settlers.Predictably, fighting broke out in short order across the entire West Bankand Gaza Strip. The Palestinian army conquered Kfar Darom and Netzarimsettlements, while heavy fighting raged around Kedumim and Efrat.Casualties on both sides mounted, reaching the hundreds.
At an emergency meeting, hastily convened by Netanyahu, Ariel Sharonpushed for the immediate recapture of the entire Palestinian territory.All of the heads of the IDF and Intelligence branches warned against sucha move, but Netanyahu had no alternative but to give the orders. A quickpoll assured him that fully 83% of public opinion supported such ameasure.
The capture of Hebron, Ramallah and Nablus was executed with relativeease. The organized opposition of the Palestinian army was crushed by IDFtanks and artillery operating on a massive scale, demolishing entireneighborhoods. But then the direst predictions of the Intelligenceagencies proved true.
Vicious guerilla warfare broke out throughout Palestinian towns. IDFsoldiers were shot down on the streets and in alleys. Dozens of tanksdeployed in the cities were destroyed by anti-tank weapons, secretlyhoarded in advance in massive quantities. Some tanks were set on fire byMoslem suicide fighters with Molotov coctails.
On the third day of the war, when IDF casualties approached a thousand,ten Israeli peace groups, under the initiative of the GGush Shalom (PeaceBloc), conducted a protest rally in Rabin Square in Tel Aviv. 15,000people came. A spokesman for “Yesh Gvul” declared that more than 100 armyofficers and soldiers had refused orders to serve in the territories andthat a brigade Commander had been dismissed as a direct result. PeaceNow, initially hesitant, hastily convened a mass rally three days laterwith 120,000 participants, many of whom showed up in military uniform.
On the fourth day of the war, Yasser Arafat was killed. In spite of theurging of all of his advisers on the day of the declaration to set up anemergency headquarters in Tunisia, he chose to remain at his command postin Gaza. According to one story he was killed by an Israeli undercovercommando unit; in another version, he perished in an air raid. Two Fatahleaders, Jibril Rajub in the West Bank and Mohammed Dakhlan in the GazaStrip, took over joint army command, while the political leadership wasturned over to the trio of Abu-Mazen, Abu-Ala and Abu-Lutuf (FaroukKadoumi).
The call for an Arab summit was not heeded in the first days, but as soonas word of Arafat’s martyrdom came, bloody riots broke out by outragedcrowds in Amman, Cairo and Riyadh. The leaders hastily convened inAlexandria and declared general mobilization of all Arab armed forces.They secretly sent an S.O.S. to President Clinton, informing him thatthere was an imminent danger to the continuation of their regimes in theabsence of immediate intervention.
On the seventh day of the war, the U.N. Security Council convened,agreeing unanimously to (a) call on both sides to stop allhostilities immediately; (b) call on Israeli forces to pull back from allof the West Bank and the Gaza Strip territories (with the exception of ofthree settlement blocks); (c) immediately accept the State of Palestine asa U.N. member; (d) open immediate negotiations for a permanent settlementof the dispute, under the leadership of the U.N. Secretary General; and(e) dispatch U.N. forces to ensure compliance with the resolution.President Clinton decided not to veto the resolution when a secret pollconfirmed that the vast majority of American Jews also supported it.
Hours later, Binyamin Netanyahu declared the establishment of a”national unity” government, which, after much agonizing,decided to abide by the U.N. Resolution. The war was over.