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Battle of Jenin
Part of Operation Defensive Shield
A Caterpillar D9L armored bulldozer used by the IDF during the battle.
Date April 3-11, 2002 (Israeli troop withdrawal on April 18) Location Jenin, West Bank Result Israeli victory
Belligerents
Israel	Fatah (Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades, Tanzim) Hamas Islamic Jihad
Commanders and leaders
Yehuda Yedidia Eyal Shlein Ofek Buchris	Hazem Qabha Zakaria Zubeidi Mahmoud Tawallbe †
Strength
1 reserve infantry brigade 2 regular infantry battalions Commando teams	Several hundreds
Casualties and losses
23 dead 52 wounded	53 dead (5 civilians according to IDF; at least 27 militants and 22 civilians according to HRW) Hundreds wounded 200 captured
Dozens of houses destroyed

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The Battle of Jenin took place from April 3 to April 11, 2002 in the Jenin refugee camp in the West Bank. Israel Defense Forces (IDF) entered the camp, and other areas under the administration of the Palestinian Authority, during the Second Intifada, as part of Operation Defensive Shield. The refugee camp of Jenin was targeted after Israel determined that the camp had, "served as a launch site for numerous terrorist attacks against both Israeli civilians and Israeli towns and villages in the area."

The IDF had not expected substantial activity from the Palestinian militants in Jenin but ended up in need of deploying armored bulldozers to clear out thousands of booby traps laid by the Palestinians inside the camp. Infantry and commando forces were used, accompanied on occasion, by assault helicopters. After an Israeli column walked into a deadly ambush, the Israelis began to rely more heavily on the use of the bulldozers inside the camp to widen pathways and knock out buildings suspected of holding militants and explosives. On April 11, Palestinian militants began to surrender and the Israeli troops withdrew from the camp on April 18.

Jenin remained sealed throughout the invasion and rumors of a massacre circulated. Stories of hundreds and even thousands of civilians being killed, and buried alive in their homes as they were demolished, and of smoldering buildings covering crushed bodies, spread throughout the Arab world. Subsequent investigations found no evidence to substantiate claims of a massacre, but did find evidence of war crimes. The final death toll was set at 52 to 56 Palestinians, of whom 5-26 were civilians. Twenty three IDF soldiers were also killed in the fighting.

Background

The Jenin camp, 600 yards long, was home to 13,055 registered Palestinian refugees. The camp was administered by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA). Unlike other camps, whose residents had come from villages depopulated in the 1948 Palestinian exodus, many of the Jenin camp's men were residents of Gaza and Tulkarm who moved into the area in the late 1970s. Many of the residents came from Jordan after the Palestinian Authority (PA) was established. Israel considered the Islamist organizations' influence in Jenin relatively mild, compared to other camps. The camp was separate from the city in that ideological differences between the various organizations hardly played a role and affiliation was mostly based on financial support. The militants repelled takeover attempts by PA seniors. In February 2002, camp residents burned seven vehicles, sent by the governor in a show of force, and opened fire on the PA men. The organizations made Ata Abu Roumeileh the chief security officer. He oversaw the entrances, placed roadblocks, investigated suspicious people and kept strangers away from the camp.

Several hundred armed men from the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, Tanzim, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and Hamas had been using the Jenin refugee camp as a base, known as "the martyrs' capital", and of the 100 suicide bombers who had launched attacks since the Second Intifada began in October 2000, 28 attacks had been launched from there. One of the key planners of attacks was Mahmoud Tawalbe, Palestinian Islamic Jihad commander of the camp.

Unlike other camps, the organizations in Jenin had a joint commander: Hazem Ahmad Rayhan Qabha, known as "Abu Jandal", an officer in the Palestinian National and Islamic Forces who had fought in Lebanon and served in the Iraqi Army. He was also involved in several encounters with the IDF. He set up a war room and divided the camp into fifteen sub-sectors, deploying about twenty armed men in each. During the battle, he began calling himself "The Martyr Abu Jandal".

Attacks attributed to Jenin

The IDF Spokesman attributed 23 successful suicide bombings and a further 6 attempted bombings as having originated from the city of Jenin during the Second Intifada prior to the undertaking of the Israeli operation. Major attacks and suicide bombings linked by Israel to various armed groups making up the militant infrastructure in Jenin include the following:

• Attacks carried out by members of Hamas on September 9, 2001 (a suicide attack in Nahariya), March 19, 2002 (a shooting attack in Hamam al-Maliach), and March 31, 2002 (a suicide attack in Haifa that left 15 casualties).

• Attacks carried out by members of Palestinian Islamic Jihad on July 16, 2001 (a suicide attack at the Binyamina Railway Station), October 28, 2001 (a shooting attack in Hadera), November 29, 2001 (a suicide attack near Pardes Hanna), January 25, 2002 (a suicide attack at the old central bus station in Tel Aviv—in cooperation with Fatah), January 5, 2002 (a suicide attack in Afula), March 20, 2002 (a suicide attack in Wadi Ara), April 10, 2002 (a suicide attack at the Yagur junction).

• Attacks carried out by members of Fatah on February 1, 2001 (a shooting of an Israeli civilian visiting Jenin), April 28, 2001 (a shooting at near Umm al-Fahm), June 28, 2001 (a shooting near Ganim), September 11, 2001 (a shooting at "Bezeq" workers near Shaked and detonation of a charge at an IDF force in the area), March 9, 2001 (a shooting near Yabed), October 4, 2001 (a shooting in Afula), October 27, 2001 (Infiltration to Mei Ami and laying of an explosives charge), November 27, 2001 (a joint PIJ and Fatah suicide attack in Afula), February 8, 2002 (a joint PIJ and Fatah suicide attack aimed at Tel Aviv, intercepted), March 12, 2002 (a shooting on the road to Katsir), March 21, 2002 (a suicide attack in Jerusalem), March 30, 2002 (a suicide attack in Tel Aviv).

Prelude

Limited Israeli forces had entered the camp along a single route twice in the previous month; they had encountered heavy resistance and quickly withdrew. Since the previous Israeli withdrawal, Palestinian militants had prepared by boobytrapping both the town and camp's streets in a bid to trap the Israeli soldiers. Following his surrender to Israeli forces, Islamic Jihad activist Tabaat Mardawi said that Palestinian fighters had spread "between 1000 and 2000 bombs and booby traps" throughout the camp, some big ones for tanks (weighing as much as 113 kilograms), most others the size of water bottles. "Omar the Engineer", a Palestinian bombmaker, said that some 50 homes were booby trapped: "We chose old and empty buildings and the houses of men who were wanted by Israel because we knew the soldiers would search for them." More powerful bombs with remote detonators were placed inside trash bins in the street and inside the cars of wanted men. Omar said that everyone in the camp, including children, knew where the explosives were located, and noted that this constituted a major weakness to their defenses, since the wires to more than a third of the bombs were cut by soldiers accompanied by collaborators.

As the fighting started, Ali Safouri, a commander of the Islamic Jihad's Al-Quds Brigades in the camp, said: "We have prepared unexpected surprises for the enemy. We are determined to pay him back double, and teach him a lesson he will not forget… We will attack him on the home front, in Jerusalem, in Haifa, and in Jaffa, everywhere. We welcome them, and we have prepared a special graveyard in the Jenin camp for them. We swore on the martyrs that we would place a curfew on the Zionist cities and avenge every drop of blood spilled upon our sacred land. We call on the soldiers of Sharon to refuse his orders, because entering the camp… the capital of the martyrs' , will, Allah willing, be the last thing they do in their lives".

The Israeli command sent in three thrusts comprised mainly of the reservist 5th Infantry Brigade from the town of Jenin to the north, as well as a company of the Nahal Brigade from the southeast and Battalion 51 of the Golani Brigade from the southwest. The force of 1,000 troops also included Shayetet 13 and Duvdevan Unit special forces, the Armoured Corps, and Combat Engineers with armored bulldozer for neutralizing the roadside bombs that would line the alleys of the camp according to Military Intelligence. Anticipating the heaviest resistance in Nablus, IDF commanders sent two regular infantry brigades there, assuming they could take over the Jenin camp in 48–72 hours with just the one reservist brigade. The force's entry was delayed until April 2 due to rain. The 5th Infantry Brigade did not have any experience in Close Quarters Combat and did not have a commander when Operation Defensive Shield started, since the last commander's service ended a few days earlier. His substitute was a reserve officer, Lieutenant Colonel Yehuda Yedidia, who got his rank after the operation began. His soldiers were not trained for urban fighting.

After an IDF action in Ramallah in March resulted in television broadcast footage that was considered unflattering, the IDF high command decided not to allow reporters to join the forces. Just prior to the incursion, the IDF declared Jenin a "closed military zone," along with other cities targeted in Defensive Shield, and it remained sealed off throughout the invasion. Water and electricity supplies to the city were also cut off and remained unavailable to residents throughout.

Battle

Israeli forces entered on 2 April, five days after the invasion of Ramallah. On the first day, reserve company commander Moshe Gerstner was killed in a PIJ sector. This caused a further delay. By April 3, Jenin was secured, and a Caterpillar D-9 bulldozer drove along a three-quarter-mile stretch of the main street to clear booby traps. An Israeli Engineering Corps officer logged 124 separate explosions set off by the bulldozer. A Fatah leader in the camp later said that it was only when his forces saw the Israelis advancing on foot that they decided to stay and fight. On the third day, the Palestinians were still dug in, and by then seven Israeli soldiers had been killed. Mardawi later testified to having killed two of them from close range, using an M-16. IDF chief of staff (Ramatkal) Shaul Mofaz urged the officers to speed things up. They asked for twenty-four more hours. Mofaz told reporters that the fighting would be complete by the end of the week, April 6. In some of the sectors, the forces were advancing at a rate of fifty meters a day.

The Israeli Intelligence assumed that the vast majority of the camp's residents were still in it. Most commanders argued that this obligated a careful advance for fear of striking civilians, and warned that using excessive force would cost the lives of hundreds of Palestinians. Lieutenant Colonel Ofek Buchris, commander of the 51st Battalion, was left in a minority opinion, saying "We're being humiliated here for four days now". When Mofaz instructed the officers to be more aggressive and fire five antitank missiles at every house before entering, one of them contemplated disobedience. Meanwhile, when asked how long he thought his forces could last given the superiority of the Israeli forces, Abu Jandal said: ""No. That's not true. We have the weapon of surprise. We have the weapon of honor. We have the divine weapon, the weapon of Allah who stands at our side. We have weapons that are better than theirs. I am the one with the truth, and I put my faith in Allah, while they put their faith in a tank".

Buchris stuck to an aggressive warfare of softening antitank fire and extensive use of bulldozers. In his sector, a method for guaranteeing lower risk to the soldiers was developed: A bulldozer rams the corner of a house, opening a hole. Then, an Achzarit arrives and disembarks troops into the house. Buchris' battalion was advancing faster than the reserve forces, creating a bridgehead within the camp, which attracted most of the Palestinian fire. During the first week of fighting, the battalion suffered five casualties. On April 8, Golani Brigade commander, Colonel Tamir, arrived from Nablus. Having crawled with Buchris to the front line, he warned that the fighting style must be changed completely - call in more troops and perhaps take the command out of the reserve brigade's hand. By evening, division commander Brigadier General Eyal Shlein told his men that the mission must be accomplished by 6:00 PM on April 9. Buchris himself was later badly wounded. As the IDF advanced, the Palestinians fell back to the heavily defended camp center - the Hawashin district. The Israelis began to call in AH-1 Cobra helicopters to hit rooftop positions along with Caterpillar D9 armored bulldozers to detonate the booby traps and clear a path for tanks.

Ambush

At 6:00 AM on April 9, reserve battalion 7020's support company was ordered to form a new line, west of the former one. Its commander, Major Oded Golomb, set out with a force to take a position in a new house. He strayed from the original path, perhaps for tactical considerations, but failed to report to his commander. The force walked into a Palestinian ambush, finding themselves in an inner courtyard surrounded by tall houses (nicknamed "the bathtub") and under fire from all directions. Rescue forces from the company and the battalion hurried to the location and were hurt by fire and explosive charges. The exchange of fire went on for several hours.

A reconnaissance aircraft documented much of the fight and the footage was transmitted live and was watched in the Israeli Central Command war room by the high ranking officers. During the battle, the Palestinians managed to snatch three Israeli soldiers' bodies into a nearby house. Colonel Ram, the Shayetet commander who had fought in the camp with his men, quickly put up a rescue force. Mofaz told him that negotiation over the bodies might force the IDF to halt the operation and get it in trouble similar to the 2000 Hezbollah cross-border raid. On the edge of the alley leading to "the bathtub", Ram questioned the wounded reservists. Finally, he broke with his troops to the nearby house and, after a battle, located the bodies and got them out. In the afternoon, all Israeli casualties were evacuated from the area. It became the deadliest day for the IDF since the end of the 1982 Lebanon War.

During that day, the IDF censored reports on the events, leading to a wave of rumors. Partial information leaked through phone calls made by reservists and internet sites. By evening, when Chief of Central Command, Brigadier General Yitzhak Eitan, had a press conference, there were rumors of a helicopter carrying dozens of fighters shot down, the death of the Ramatkal's deputy and a heart attack suffered by the Israeli Minister of Defense.

Change in Israeli tactics

After the ambush, all Israeli forces began to advance by the "Buchris method" of using bulldozers and APCs. Several officers demanded that F-16s be sent to drop bombs, but the IDF high command refused. The number of Caterpillar D9s in operation increased to a dozen, and the IDF maintained that the heavy bulldozers were mainly used to clear walls and streets of booby traps, open routes and widen alleyways for armored fighting vehicles, and to secure locations and movement for IDF troops.

A day later, Mahmoud Tawallbe and two other militants went into a house so as to get close enough to a tank or armored D-9 bulldozer to plant a bomb. According to a British military expert working in the camp for Amnesty International, a D9 driver probably saw him and rammed a wall down onto him. The Islamic Jihad website announced that Tawallbe had died on April 6, when he blew up in his booby-trapped home on the Israeli soldiers inside it, and that he "had thwarted all attempts by the occupation to evacuate the camp residents to make it easier for the Israelis to destroy on the heads of the fighters."

At 7:00 AM on April 11, the Palestinians began to surrender. Qabha refused to surrender, and was among the last to die. Zakaria Zubeidi was among the only fighters who did not surrender. He slipped out of the area surrounded by the IDF, moved through the houses and left. Mardawi surrendered along with Ali Suleiman al-Saadi, known as "Safouri", and thirty-nine others. He later said that "There was nothing I could do against that bulldozer".

Aftermath

On April 18, Israeli troops withdrew from the camp. The first independent observers were granted access to the camp two days earlier, on April 16. Israeli intelligence estimated that half the population of noncombatants had left before the invasion, and 90% had done so by the third day, leaving around 1,300 people. Others estimated that 4,000 people had remained in the camp, without access to food, water, and electricity, over the course of the invasion.

The BBC reported that ten percent of the camp was destroyed in the fighting. David Holley, a Major in the British Territorial Army and a military adviser to Amnesty International, reported that an area within the refugee camp of about 100m by 200m was flattened. According to Stephen Graham, the IDF had systematically bulldozed an area measuring 160 x 250m in the Jenin refugee camp. The Hawashin neighbourhood was levelled. Many residents had no advance warning, and some were buried alive.

Human Rights Watch (HRW) and Amnesty International (AI) said 4,000 people were rendered homeless as a result of the IDF incursion. HRW listed 140 buildings, most of which housed multiple families, as completely destroyed, and 200 other buildings as sustaining damage rendering them uninhabitable or unsafe for use. AI said complete destruction affected 164 houses with 374 apartment units, and that other buildings had been partially destroyed. Israel said those numbers were exaggerations.

On May 31, 2002 the Israeli newspaper Yediot Aharonot published an interview with Moshe Nissim, nicknamed "Kurdi Bear", a D-9 operator who took part in the battle. Nissim said he had driven his D-9 for seventy-five hours straight, drinking whiskey to avoid fatigue, and that apart from a two-hour training before the battle, he had no prior experience in driving a bulldozer. He said he had begged his officers to let him destroy more houses and added: "I didn't see, with my own eyes, people dying under the blade of the D-9. and I didn't see house falling down on live people. But if there were any, I wouldn't care at all."

The Israelis claimed to have found explosive-making labs and factories for assembling Qassam II rockets. One Israeli special forces commander who fought in the camp said that "the Palestinians were admirably well prepared. They correctly analyzed the lessons of the previous raid". General Dan Harel, Head of the IDF Operations Directorate, said "There were indications it was going to be hard, but we didn't think it was going to be so hard". An internal investigation published by the IDF six months after the battle implicitly cast the responsibility for the death of the thirteen soldiers on the soldiers themselves, for straying from their path unreported. It also said that the focusing on the rescue instead of subduing the enemy complicated things. Buchris was given the Chief of Staff citation.

Mardawi told CNN from his prison in Israel, that after learning the IDF was going to use troops, and not planes, "It was like hunting ... like being given a prize... The Israelis knew that any soldier who went into the camp like that was going to get killed... I've been waiting for a moment like that for years". After leaving Ramallah on May 14, 2002, PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat praised the refugees' endurance and compared the fighting to the Battle of Stalingrad. Addressing a gathering of about 200 people in Jenin, he said: "People of Jenin, all the citizens of Jenin and the refugee camp, this is Jenin-grad. Your battle has paved the way to the liberation of the occupied territories". The battle became known among the Palestinians as "Jeningrad".

Removal of bodies

The IDF intended to bury those identified by the army as terrorists in a special cemetery for fallen enemy troops in the Jordan Valley. Some of the bodies had already been removed from the camp Thursday and moved to a site near Jenin, but had not been buried. Others had been buried by Palestinians during the battle in a mass grave near the hospital on the outskirts of the camp. The petitioners claimed the IDF's decision violated international law as the Jordan Valley cemetery would be a mass grave and dishonor the dead.

On April 12, in response to a petition presented by the Adalah organization, the Israeli High Court ordered the IDF not to remove the bodies of Palestinians killed in battle until a hearing was held on the matter. The petition was signed by MKs Mohammed Barakeh and Ahmed Tibi. Following the court's decision, issued by Supreme Court President Aharon Barak, the IDF stopped clearing the bodies from the camp. On April 15, Adalah and LAW, the Palestinian Society for the Protection of Human Rights and the Environment, filed a petition, asking the Court to order the IDF to immediately hand over the bodies of Palestinians to the International Committee of the Red Cross or the Palestinian Red Crescent Society, claiming that despite Sunday's court's ruling, the IDF was leaving the bodies of dead Palestinians to rot in the Jenin refugee camp.

Casualties

Initially, reporting of casualty numbers varied widely and fluctuated day to day. On April 10, the BBC reported that Israel estimated 150 Palestinians had died in Jenin but the Palestinians were saying the number was far higher. Saeb Erekat, on a phone interview to CNN from Jericho, estimated 500 dead in Operation Defensive Shield in total. On April 11, the Palestinians reported 500 dead. On April 12, Brigadier-General Ron Kitri said on Israeli Army Radio that there are apparently hundreds killed. He later retracted this statement. Secretary-General of the Palestinian Authority, Ahmed Abdel Rahman, said that thousands of Palestinians had been killed and buried in mass graves, or lay under houses destroyed in Jenin and Nablus. On April 13, Palestinian Information Minister, Yasser Abed Rabbo, accused Israel of digging mass graves for 900 Palestinians in the camp. On April 14, the IDF gave a final figure of 45 casualties. On April 18, Zalman Shoval, adviser to Sharon, spoke of 65 bodies, five of them civilians. On April 30, Qadoura Mousa, director of the Fatah for the northern West Bank, set the total dead at fifty-six.

After the battle, the UN estimated the death toll at 52 Palestinians and 23 Israelis. One Palestinian Fatah official reportedly put the death toll at fifty-six. In 2004, Haaretz journalists Amos Harel and Avi Isacharoff wrote that 23 Israelis had died and 52 had been wounded; Palestinian casualties included 53 dead, hundreds wounded and about 200 captured. According to retired IDF General Shlomo Gazit, the death toll was 55 Palestinians and 33 Israels.

Human Rights Watch documented 22 civilian killings during the IDF incursion, and said that "Many of them were killed willfully or unlawfully, and in some cases constituted war crimes." Examples highlighted in the report include the case of 57-year old Kamal Zugheir who was shot and then run over by IDF tanks while in his wheelchair, and that of 37-year old Jamal Fayid, a quadraplegic crushed to death in the rubble of his home after an IDF bulldozer advanced upon it, refusing to allow his family to intervene to remove him.

UN fact-finding mission

On April 8, a UN envoy, Terje Roed-Larsen, said the devastation in the camp was "horrific beyond belief". He said it was "morally repugnant" that Israel had not allowed emergency workers in for 11 days to provide humanitarian relief. UN Secretary General, Kofi Annan, has asked the Security Council to consider sending an armed multinational force to the region, under Chapter Seven of the UN Charter which authorizes military force to impose council decisions. Israeli Foreign Minister, Shimon Peres told Annan that Israel would welcome a UN official "to clarify the facts", saying "Israel has nothing to hide regarding the operation in Jenin. Our hands are clean". On April 19, the Security Council unanimously passed a resolution to send a fact-finding mission to Jenin. Abed Rabbo said the mission was "the first step toward making Sharon stand trial before an international tribunal". The fact-finding team was led by former Finnish President, Martti Ahtisaari. The other two members were Cornelio Sommaruga, former president of the International Committee of the Red Cross (controversial in Israel for previous "Red Swastika" remarks), and Sadako Ogata, the former UN high commissioner for refugees who was Japan's special envoy on Afghan reconstruction.

Head of the IDF Operation Branch, Major General Giora Eiland, convinced Mofaz that the team would demand investigating officers and soldiers, and that it might accuse Israel of war crimes. He warned that it would pave the road to an international force. Eiland and Mofaz's position was accepted by Sharon. Official Israeli sources said that Israel was surprised that the composition of the team was not discussed with them in advance, adding "We expected that the operational aspects of the fact-finding mission would be carried out by military experts". On April 22, Israeli Defense Minister, Benjamin Ben-Eliezer and Peres spoke to Annan. Ben-Eliezer expressed his disappointment at the make-up of the team, and expressed his hope that the mission would not overstep its mandate. Peres asked Annan to deny reports that the mission would look into events outside the refugee camp, and that the finding would have legal validity. Annan said that the mission would only investigate what happened inside Jenin, but may have to interview residents currently outside the camp. He added that the findings would not be legally binding.

The Israeli government was concerned about the mission, and the cabinet secretary, Gideon Saar, threatened to ban the team from entering Jenin. On April 23, Sharon, decided the team was no longer acceptable. The reason given was the lack of military experts on the UN team. Israel also claimed not to have been adequately consulted. The US rebuked Sharon's decision, and a White House official said "We were the sponsors of that and we want it implemented as written. We support the initiative of the secretary general". On April 24, Annan refused to delay the mission. Ben-Eliezer said: "In the last month alone, 137 people were slaughtered by Palestinians and nearly 700 wounded. Is there any one who is investigating that?" On April 25, the UN agreed to postpone by two days the arrival of the team, and agreed to an Israeli request that two military officers be added to the team. Annan said the talks with Israel talks had been "very, very constructive and I'm sure we'll be able to sort out our differences". Peres said that a delay would give the Israeli cabinet the opportunity to discuss the mission before the team arrived. Israeli Government spokesman, Avi Pazner, said that he expected the UN mission to investigate "terrorist activity" and guarantee immunity for Israeli soldiers. Israel Radio said that Israel was also pushing for the right for both sides to review the team's report before was to be presented to Annan. On April 28, Israeli Communications Minister, Reuven Rivlin, told reporters after a lengthy cabinet meeting that the UN had gone back on its agreements with Israel over the team, and so it would not be allowed to arrive. Speaking for the cabinet, he said that the composition of the team and its terms of reference made it inevitable that its report would blame Israel. The Security Council convened to discuss Israel's decision not to grant entry to the UN team. Meanwhile, the AIPAC lobby in Washington was called to pressure Annan and George W. Bush.

On April 30, Annan decided to disband the team, On May 2, the team was disbanded. On May 4, Israel was isolated in an open debate in the Security Council. The deputy US ambassador to the UN, James Cunningham, said it was "regrettable" Israel had decided not to cooperate with the fact-finding team. Nasser Al-Kidwa, the Palestinian observer to the UN, said the council failed to give Annan its full support, and that the council caved in to "blackmailing" by the Israeli Government. The General Assembly passed a resolution condemning Israel's military action in Jenin by 74 votes to four, with 54 abstentions. The Bush administration supported Israel as part of a deal in which Sharon agreed to lift the siege of the Mukataa in Ramallah.

Report

On July 31, the UN issued its report indicating at the time the report was issued 52 Palestinians killed had been verified and it's possible that as many as half of them were civilians. The UN criticized the Palestinians and the Israelis for having exposed civilians to danger. The Israeli Foreign Ministry indicated that the report "repudiates malicious lies". Daniel Taub, a senior Foreign Ministry official, said "There was no massacre, and statements by the Palestinian leadership talking about hundreds of civilians that were killed were nothing more than atrocity propaganda".

The Palestinians disagreed. Erekat said that an "Israeli massacre in Jenin's refugee camp clearly happened" and that "crimes against humanity also took place". Palestinian Planning Minister, Nabil Shaath, said: "I know it does not satisfy everybody ... but still it identifies what happens in Jenin as a war crime against humanity and that is very important". Annan denounced Israel's refusal to admit the UN investigators into the camp but said "I would hope that both parties will draw the right lessons from this tragic episode and take steps to end the cycle of violence which is killing innocent civilians on both sides". He added that "While some of the facts may be in dispute, I think it is clear that the Palestinian population have suffered and are suffering the humanitarian consequences which are very severe".

Massacre allegations

The battle attracted widespread international attention due to allegations that a massacre had been committed. On April 4, The Observer reported that Palestinians called the incident a 'massacre', alleging that houses were bulldozed with families still inside, helicopters fired indiscriminately on a civilian area, and ambulances were prevented from reaching the wounded. A camp resident who worked at the Jenin hospital said: "I saw the Israelis line up five young men with their legs spread and their hands up as they faced a wall. The soldiers then sprayed them from head to toe with gunfire". CNN correspondent, Ben Wedeman, heard stories of bodies being loaded into trucks and driven away, and of bodies being left in the sewers and bulldozed. Palestinian cabinet minister, Saeb Erekat, accused the Israelis of trying to cover up the killing of civilians.

On April 9, Haaretz reported that Foreign Minister Shimon Peres was privately referring to the battle as a "massacre" but the next day, they reported Peres for expressing concerns that "Palestinian propaganda is liable to accuse Israel that a 'massacre' took place in Jenin rather than a pitched battle against heavily armed terrorists". Haaretz editor Hanoch Marmari later said in a lecture that "Some correspondents might have been obsessive in their determination to unearth a massacre in a refugee camp". Mouin Rabbani, Director of the Palestinian American Research Center in Ramallah, cited Peres' alleged statement and his office's decision to establish a PR committee as an indication that a massacre had taken place.

In early May, Human Rights Watch completed its report on Jenin. The report said there was no massacre, but accused the IDF of war crimes. On April 18, Derrick Pounder, a British forensic expert who was part of an Amnesty International team granted access to Jenin, said: "I must say that the evidence before us at the moment doesn't lead us to believe that the allegations are anything other than truthful and that therefore there are large numbers of civilian dead underneath these bulldozed and bombed ruins that we see".

In November, Amnesty International reported that there was "clear evidence" that the IDF committed war crimes against Palestinian civilians, including unlawful killings and torture, in Jenin and Nablus. The report also accused Israel of blocking medical care, using people as human shields and bulldozing houses with residents inside, as well as beating prisoners, which resulted in one death, and preventing ambulances and aid organizations from reaching the areas of combat even after the fighting had reportedly been stopped. Amnesty criticized the UN report, noting that its officials did not actually visit Jenin. The Observer reporter, Peter Beaumont, wrote that what happened in Jenin was not a massacre, but that the mass destruction of houses was a war crime.

In early May, the IDF released a videotape showing what it called "a phony funeral that the Palestinians organized in order to multiply the number of casualties in Jenin". The tape showed six people putting a green sheet on the ground. In the next scene, someone was walking toward the sheet, lying on it before being wrapped inside. The following scene showed a procession of over a dozen people, some of them carrying the body and then dropping it. Then, the dropped person unwraps the sheet and runs away, along with several other participants in the procession. LAW, the Palestinian Society for the Protection of Human Rights, held a press conference on May 8, disputing the conclusions drawn by Israel. LAW stated that Mohammad Bakri who was in Jenin on April 28, making his documentary film Jenin, Jenin, shot the same footage from the ground, and that it shows a group of children playing "funeral" near the cemetry. LAW added that, "The media uncritically took up the Israeli spokesmen conclusions, without investigating what the footage actually shows."

Harel and Issacharoff wrote that the IDF's misconduct with the media, including Kitri's statement, contributed to the allegations of massacre. Mofaz later admitted that the limitations imposed on the media were a mistake. Head of the Operations Directorate, General Dan Harel, said: "Today, I would send a reporter in every APC".

According to Lorenzo Cremonesi, the correspondent for the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera in Jerusalem, who visited the camp on April 13, 2002, the hospital was almost deserted as doctors played cards in the emergency room. He spoke to 25 lightly wounded patients who told heartrending stories but when asked for names of the dead and urged to show where the bodies were, became evasive. "In short, it was all talk and nothing could be verified," wrote Cremonesi. "At the end of that day, I wrote that the death toll was not more than 50 and most of them were combatants". Cremonesi criticized Israel's exclusion of the media from Jenin, saying, "If you hide something from me, that means first and foremost that you want to hide it, and secondly, that you have done something wrong."

See also

• Jenin, Jenin
• The Road to Jenin

References

1. ^ Harel and Isacharoff (2004), pp. 257-258
2. ^ Rees, Matt. "Inside the Battle of Jenin". Time Magazine. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
3. ^ "Jenin's Terrorist Infrastructure". Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs. 2002-04-04. Retrieved September 22 2008. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help); Unknown parameter |dateformat= ignored (help)
4. Palestinians: Thousands in mass graves, United Press International, April 12, 2002
   - Secretary-General of Palestinian Authority Cabinet Ahmed Abdel Rahman said, "They (Israeli soldiers) took hundreds of bodies to northern Israeli to hide their massacre they committed against our people.
   "This massacre is not less than the massacres committed against the Palestinian people in the refugee camps of Sabra and Shatila in Lebanon."
   He said thousands of Palestinians were either killed and buried in massive graveyards or smashed under houses destroyed in Jenin and Nablus.
5. ^ Harel and Isacharoff (2004), p. 254
6. ^ Lee, Ken (2003-06-24). "Jenin rises from the dirt". BBC. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
7. Harel and Isacharoff (2004), pp. 254-255
8. ^ "The Palestinian Account of the Battle of Jenin". MEMRI. 90 (April 23, 2002). {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
9. "Suicide Bombers from Jenin". Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs. 2002-07-02. Retrieved 2008-10-18.
10. ^ Cook, Jonathan. "The 'engineer'". Al-Ahram. No. 582. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
11. ^ "Palestinian fighter describes 'hard fight' in Jenin". CNN.com. 2002-04-23. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
12. Harel and Isacharoff (2004), pp. 253-254
13. ^ Harel and Isacharoff (2004), p. 259
14. Selby, 2003, p. 1.
15. ^ "Expert weighs up Jenin 'massacre'". BBC. 2002-04-29. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
16. ^ Harel and Isacharoff (2004), p. 255
17. ^ Harel and Isacharoff (2004), p. 256
18. ^ "Citation to Golani battalion commander badly wounded in Defensive Shield". nrg. 2002-07-08. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help) Template:He icon
19. Harel and Isacharoff (2004), pp. 256-257
20. ^ Harel and Isacharoff (2004), p. 257
21. ^ Harel and Isacharoff (2004), p. 258
22. McDonald and Fischer, 2005, p. 589/
23. Europa, 2004, p. 33.
24. Gresh and Vidal, 2004 p. 169.
25. Graham, 2004, p. 207.
26. ^ MacDonald, 2007, p. 82.
27. Winslow, 2007, p. 221, footnote #4.
28. Winslow (2008), pp. 69-70. Gush Shalom's English translation of the full interview can be seen here.
29. Gush Shalom Moshe Nissim interview in Hebrew
30. Saporito, Bill (2002-04-14). "Jenin: Defiant to the Death". Time. ISSN 0040-718X. {{cite news}}: Check |issn= value (help); Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
31. Bennet, James (2002-05-14). "Arafat Finally Leaves Ramallah, But Avoids Testy Crowd at Camp". The New York Times. Retrieved 2009-02-22.
32. Whitaker, Brian (2002-05-14). "Anger as Arafat shuns camp". The Guardian. Retrieved 2009-02-22.
33. Belden, Paul (2003-04-09). "A street fight called Jeningrad". Asia Times. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
34. ^ Harel, Amos (2002-04-14). "Court rejects petitions demanding IDF not remove Jenin dead". Haaretz. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help); Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
35. Harel, Amos (2002-04-13). "Court: IDF can't move bodies; Lieberman: Barak must be ousted". Haaretz. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help); Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
36. Hass, Amira (2002-04-16). "Court told: IDF leaving dead to rot in Jenin". Haaretz. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help); Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
37. "Israeli pull-out on hold after bombing". BBC. 2002-04-10. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
38. "Colin Powell's Challenge". CNN.com. 2002-04-10. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
39. Wedeman, Ben (2002-04-11). "Access to Jenin difficult". CNN.com. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
40. Sadeh, Sharon (2002-05-16). "How Jenin battle became a 'massacre'". The Guardian. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
41. "Palestinians: Hundreds in Mass Graves". Newsmax.com. 2002-04-13. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
42. Jenin refugee camp emerges defeated, sabcnews.com
43. Shuman, Ellis and israelinsider staff (2002-04-14). "Security: IDF now estimates 45 Palestinians died in Jenin fighting". Israelinsider. Retrieved 2008-06-30.
44. ^ "Jenin 'massacre evidence growing'". BBC. 2002-04-18. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
45. ^ Martin, Paul (2002-05-01). "Jenin 'massacre' reduced to death toll of 56". The Washington Times. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
46. ^ "UN says no massacre in Jenin". BBC. 2002-08-01. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
47. Herzog & Gazit (2005), p. 433
48. Human Rights Watch, 2004, p. p. 460.
49. "Jenin camp 'horrific beyond belief'". BBC. 2002-04-18. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
50. "UN to send mission to Jenin". Telegraph. 2002-04-20. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
51. Vulliamy, Ed (2002-04-21). "Israel: We have nothing to hide in Jenin probe". The Guardian. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help); Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
52. "Kofi's Choice: The U.N. secretary general gets entangled in l'Affaire Sommaruga" Jewish World Review May 10, 2002
53. ^ Benn, Aluf (2002-04-23). "Ben-Eliezer, Peres to Annan: Israel unhappy with Jenin delegation". Haaretz. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help); Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
54. ^ Harel and Isacharoff (2004), p. 260
55. Goldenberg, Suzanne (2002-04-24). "Israel blocks UN mission to Jenin". The Guardian. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
56. Philps, Alan (2002-04-25). "Israel defies UN over Jenin mission". Telegraph. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
57. "U.N. delays arrival of Jenin team until Sunday". CNN.com. 2002-04-26. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
58. "Jenin mission delayed until Sunday". BBC. 2002-04-27. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
59. Benn, Aluf (2002-04-29). "Security Council meets after Israel denies entry to UN team". Haaretz. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
60. Curtius, Mary (2002-05-01). "Annan Urges U.N. to Drop Jenin Probe". Los Angeles Times. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help); Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
61. "Annan disbands Jenin investigation team". RTÉ News. 2002-05-03. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
62. "Israel isolated in UN debate over Jenin mission". ABC News Online. 2002-05-04. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
63. Watson, Rob (2002-05-08). "UN condemns Israel over Jenin". BBC. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
64. Report of the Secretary-General on Jenin. United Nations. 2002-06-07. {{cite conference}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
    - Fifty-two Palestinian deaths had been confirmed by the hospital in Jenin by the end of May 2002.
    - By the time of the IDF withdrawal and the lifting of the curfew on 18 April, at least 52 Palestinians, of whom up to half may have been civilians, and 23 Israeli soldiers were dead.
65. Philps, Alan (2002-08-02). "UN clears Israel of massacre at Jenin". Telegraph. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
66. Siemaszko, Corky (2002-08-02). "No Jenin Massacre, UN Reports". Daily News. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
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68. Beaumont, Peter (2002-04-14). "Ten-day ordeal in crucible of Jenin". The Guardian. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
69. "Evidence and Reality Collide in a Battle of Words". Sydney Morning Herald. ISSN 0312-6315. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
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Bibliography

• Europa Regional Surveys of the World 2004 Series (2004). The Middle East and North Africa 2004 (50th, illustrated ed.). Routledge. ISBN 1857431847, 9781857431841. {{cite book}}: Check |isbn= value: invalid character (help)CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
• Graham, Stephen (2004). Cities, war, and terrorism: towards an urban geopolitics (22nd, illustrated ed.). Wiley-Blackwell. ISBN 1405115750, 9781405115759. {{cite book}}: Check |isbn= value: invalid character (help)
• Harel, Amos (2004). The Seventh War. Tel-Aviv: Yedioth Aharonoth Books and Chemed Books. p. 431. ISBN 9655117677. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help) Template:He icon
• Herzog, Chaim (2005). The Arab-Israeli Wars: War and Peace in the Middle East. Vintage. p. 560. ISBN 1400079632. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
• Human Rights Watch (2003). Human Rights Watch World Report, 2003 (Revised ed.). Human Rights Watch. ISBN 1564322858, 9781564322852. {{cite book}}: Check |isbn= value: invalid character (help)
• Selby, Jan (2003). Water, power and politics in the Middle East: the other Israeli-Palestinian conflict (Illustrated ed.). I.B. Tauris. ISBN 1860649343, 9781860649349. {{cite book}}: Check |isbn= value: invalid character (help)
• MacDonald, Théodore Harney (2007). The global human right to health: dream or possibility?. Radcliffe Publishing. ISBN 1846192013, 9781846192012. {{cite book}}: Check |isbn= value: invalid character (help)
• McDonald, Avril; Fischer, H. (2005). Yearbook of International Humanitarian Law, Volume 5. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9067041890, 9789067041898. {{cite book}}: Check |isbn= value: invalid character (help)
• Gresh, Alain; Vidal, Dominique (2004). The new A-Z of the Middle East (2nd, illustrated ed.). I.B. Tauris. ISBN 1860643264, 9781860643262. {{cite book}}: Check |isbn= value: invalid character (help)
• Winslow, Philip C. (2008-09-01). Victory for Us Is to See You Suffer: In the West Bank with the Palestinians and the Israelis. Beacon Press. ISBN 0807069078.

Further reading

• Goldberg, Brett (2003). A Psalm in Jenin. Israel: Modan Publishing House. p. 304. ISBN 965-7141-03-6.
• Baroud, Ramzy Mohammed, editor (2003). Searching Jenin: Eyewitness Accounts of the Israeli Invasion 2002. Seattle, Washington: Cune Press. p. 256. ISBN 1885942346. {{cite book}}: |first= has generic name (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)

External links

• Report of the Secretary-General on Jenin. United Nations. 2002-06-07. {{cite conference}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
• Israel and the Occupied Territories: Shielded from scrutiny: IDF violations in Jenin and Nablus. Amnesty International. 2002-11-04. {{cite conference}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
• "Jenin: IDF Military Operations". Human Rights Watch. 14, No. 3 (E) (May 2002). {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)

32°27′37.04″N 35°18′4.88″E / 32.4602889°N 35.3013556°E / 32.4602889; 35.3013556

• Conflicts in 2002
• Battles involving Israel
• Israeli-Palestinian conflict
• Jenin
• Media bias controversies
• Urban warfare
• 2002 in Israel