The First Intifada
A mass popular uprising erupts in Gaza and spreads across the occupied territories, defined by strikes, boycotts, and stone-throwing youth.
The first intifada — Arabic for “shaking off” — began on 9 December 1987 in Gaza’s Jabalia refugee camp, a day after an Israeli truck collided with a car carrying Palestinian workers, killing four. Within days, demonstrations spread across the Gaza Strip and the West Bank.
The uprising was largely unarmed and grassroots-led: general strikes, commercial boycotts, refusal to pay taxes, and confrontations in which Palestinian youths threw stones at soldiers. A clandestine Unified National Leadership coordinated the movement, while new committees organized food, education, and mutual aid. Hamas emerged in the uprising’s first days as an Islamist rival to the PLO.
Over six years, Israeli forces killed more than a thousand Palestinians, and Palestinians killed around two hundred Israelis, according to B’Tselem. The intifada transformed international perception of the conflict and set the stage for the PLO’s 1988 Declaration of Independence in Algiers, the 1991 Madrid Conference, and ultimately the Oslo process.
Cited works
2- britannica.com — intifada(opens in a new tab)https://www.britannica.com/event/intifada
- btselem.org — first intifada tables(opens in a new tab)https://www.btselem.org/statistics/first_intifada_tables
Connected in the archive
12 connected records12 records elsewhere in the archive are linked to this one, each by a piece of evidence you can read below.
names this record — 11 records
One record names the other. A pointer for reading, not a claim that they belong to each other.
- Faisal al-Husseiniفيصل الحسيني
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: In 1980 he founded the Arab Studies Society with a group of Palestinian academics; the Israeli authorities harassed and repeatedly closed it, and placed Husseini under house arrest from 1982 to 1987. In 1987 he set up the Palestinian Human Rights Center and the Committee Against the Iron Fist, and became one of the most prominent leaders of the First Intifada, detained intermittently until 1989.
- Intifada
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: The First Intifada erupted on 9 December 1987 in Gaza's Jabalia refugee camp, after an Israeli military vehicle collided with a civilian car and killed four Palestinian workers, and spread rapidly across the occupied territories.
- Intissar al-Wazir (Umm Jihad)انتصار الوزير (أم جهاد)
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: She became a member of the Palestine National Council in 1974, took a history degree from the University of Damascus in 1978, and joined Fatah's Revolutionary Council in 1981. In April 1988, after six years in Tunis, an Israeli commando assassinated her husband — by then the PLO's second figure and the architect of support for the First Intifada — in front of her at their home.
- Khalida Jarrarخالدة جرار
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: …human rights in 2003. Politically active from a young age in the voluntary work committees of the West Bank, she was first arrested on 8 March 1989, during the First Intifada, after a demonstration on International Women's Day.…
- Khalil al-Wazir (Abu Jihad)خليل الوزير (أبو جهاد)
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: Al-Wazir was one of the principal architects of the First Intifada, which broke out in December 1987, and took part in leading and supplying it until his death.
- Marwan Barghoutiمروان البرغوثي
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: Released in 1983, he studied history and political science at Birzeit University and rose as a student leader in the years before the First Intifada, until Israel deported him to Jordan in May 1987, months before it began.
- and 5 more
named in this record — 1 record
One record names the other. A pointer for reading, not a claim that they belong to each other.
- The Madrid Peace Conference
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: The intifada transformed international perception of the conflict and set the stage for the PLO's 1988 Declaration of Independence in Algiers, the 1991 Madrid Conference, and ultimately the Oslo process.
Cite this page
Every claim above carries its sources — citation is the point.
- Chicago
“The First Intifada.” Timeline, FALASTEEN.AI. Accessed 22 August 2026. https://falasteen.ai/timeline/first-intifada.- MLA
“The First Intifada.” Timeline, FALASTEEN.AI, 2026, https://falasteen.ai/timeline/first-intifada. Accessed 22 August 2026.- BibTeX
@misc{falasteen-first-intifada, title = {The First Intifada}, howpublished = {\url{https://falasteen.ai/timeline/first-intifada}}, organization = {FALASTEEN.AI — A Living Archive for Palestine}, year = {2026}, note = {Accessed 2026-08-22} }