5. The Second Intifada with Sahar Francis

The Second Intifada (~2000-2008) came out of the failure of the Oslo Accords, the failure of the PLO to create a Palestinian state, the crippling of the Palestinian economy through Israeli restrictions and Israel’s increasingly aggressive and violent settler expansion and colonial oppression.

In contrast to the First Intifada, the Second Intifada was marked by a series of bloody terrorist bombings against Israeli civilians. The renowned Palestinian historian Rashid Khalidi laments this dark development in his book “The 100 Years’ War on Palestine”, describing how different Palestinian armed factions from Hamas to Fatah expressed their rivalry through a kind of competition in suicide bombings. Part of it was desperation, part of it was blind revenge against the Israeli population for the Israeli Occupation Forces’ heavy handed response to Palestinian protests - where thousands of Palestinians throwing rocks were gunned down down by Israeli soldiers.

It was always the case however, and still is, that far more Palestinians were killed than Israelis. During this uprising, Khalidi estimates that 4,916 Palestinians and 1,100 Israelis were killed.

Episode 5 of the Kalam podcast explores this difficult period, with the General Director of the Palestinian prisoner support organisation, Addameeer, Sahar Francis.

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