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suicide bomber entered a hotel in Netanya, just north of Tel Aviv, killing twenty-nine Israelis
participating in a Passover seder.
The fi ghting also affected others. On April 2, 2002, Fatah, Hamas, and the Islamic Jihad
seized control of one of Christianity's most revered sites, the Church of the Nativity in Beth-
lehem. The group took the Christian clerics there hostage and fi red on IDF soldiers. The siege
lasted until a compromise was reached on May 10. The gunmen accepted deportation to the
Gaza Strip or Europe.
With casualties rising, no hope of a diplomatic solution, and the PA clearly unwilling to
stop the fi ghting, Israel's government launched a major offensive on March 29, 2002, named
Operation Defensive Shield, to defeat the insurgency. The PA and its institutions seemed to be
the confl ict's source, so Israeli tanks attacked the installations of the PA security forces, entered
Palestinian towns, and took control of most of them for the fi rst time since 1994. Arafat was
besieged in his headquarters compound.
The heaviest fi ghting during Operation Defensive Shield occurred at the Jenin refugee camp
in the northern West Bank, where IDF soldiers fought Palestinian gunmen in house-to-house
combat. To follow the rules of engagement, meant to prevent civilian casualties, often put Is-
raeli soldiers' lives at risk. On April 9, thirteen Israeli army reservists were killed upon entering
a booby-trapped building in the refugee camp. In all, twenty-three Israeli soldiers died in the
fi ghting there. Afterward, elements of the international news media reported that Israeli forces
had destroyed large portions of the camp, even though aerial photographs showed this to be
untrue. Palestinian spokespeople also spread the story that Israeli troops had massacred up to
500 Palestinian civilians in Jenin, a story picked up uncritically by much of the Western media.
Later, a UN investigation showed that these claims were untrue and that very few Palestinian
civilians had died in the fi ghting.
Exaggerations and misrepresentations of its military actions were a growing problem for Is-
rael. Not only were Palestinian forces originating claims of war crimes and other misdeeds, of-
ten deliberately fabricating them, but the stories were gaining credibility with the international
media, foreign groups, and even Western governments.
To save the PA, the United States urged Israel to limit its offensive. On April 6, the UN Secu-
rity Council adopted Resolution 1403 urging a ceasefi re and IDF withdrawal from Palestinian
towns once the PA accepted a ceasefi re. But U.S. attempts to broker a ceasefi re failed, since
Sharon would not agree to a withdrawal timetable and Arafat would not pledge to control the
terrorist groups.
When Sharon announced that Israel would keep fi ghting until the terrorist forces were de-
stroyed, the United States again, on April 9, asked Israel to withdraw. The Israeli army pulled
out of Kalkilya and Tulkarm but continued operations elsewhere. In response to U.S. requests
and pressures, Israel allowed Arafat to leave his Ramallah compound and travel freely in the
PA-ruled territories on May 2, after he agreed to try the murderers of the Israeli tourism min-
ister, Rehavam Ze'evi, assassinated by the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine at a
Jerusalem hotel in October 2001. Arafat did not keep this pledge.
About 4,000 Palestinians had been arrested during Operation Defensive Shield, including
Barghouti, who was later tried and convicted for organizing and leading the intifada. The
