Bethlehem- Ma'an- Report by Hayat Hamdan- Resistance operations in Palestine are part of the forms of expression of popular rejection of the Israeli occupation and its violations against civilians. Through them, Palestinians seek to achieve national goals related to liberation from the occupation, but the results of these operations often vary between success and failure. The question here is about the effectiveness of these operations: Are the resistance fighters able to escape after carrying them out, or are the majority subject to arrest or direct killing before or during their implementation? Does a Palestinian risk his life for ill-considered targets? Is this risk worth the price paid? How has the current popular resistance differed from what it was during the period of the Stone Intifada in 1987 and the Al-Aqsa Intifada in 2000? These questions and others will be discussed by presenting realistic models in this report from stories of resistance in both periods, in addition to the opinions of some write rs and activists about the effectiveness of these resistance operations. After nearly three decades since the start of the Intifada of the Stones, and while our people are being subjected to genocide in the Gaza Strip for the eleventh consecutive month, the popular resistance is beginning to take its place in the West Bank with fedayeen operations, whether they are organized collective or individual, unplanned and not linked to a specific political party. But together, they fall under the framework of popular protest against a 76-year occupation that has practiced all forms of oppression and human rights violations against the Palestinians, in addition to the attacks of its settlers on defenseless civilians in their homes and on their agricultural lands. The current popular resistance is different in its details from the period of the first and second intifada. The stone was the flame of the intifada and had a popular impact in an unprecedented collective uprising of the Palestinian people. The universities were a source of organizations on all occasions and events. The word had value, as did the stone, the slogans, raising the Palestinian flag, and all the unarmed activities that had an impact on the popular resistance. Not all resistance operations are failures, nor are all of these operations successful or well-studied and planned. Individual operations were and still are the operations most closely linked to personal motivation and the psychological factor of revenge for the situation our people are going through. There are dozens of cases of children, youth, women and young men who were martyred at points of contact in ill-studied operations, but national feelings and the psychological state are what motivated the feeling of the need to carry out resistance operations. In a special interview for this report, the activist and released prisoner (M.H.) shared with us his story of carrying out a resistance operation during the Stone Intifada, in which one of his friends participated. The aim was to disrupt th e occupation's work in expanding settlement streets and tunnels in the West Bank: 'There were two guards in the place with weapons. Our goal was to be able to take their weapons, so we went with two pistols that belonged to one of the wanted men at the time. The plan was to shoot at point-blank range at the guards on a night when there were no workers at the site. We went and found the two guards. We talked to them for a while, then I started shooting at one of them and he was hit by three bullets. As for my colleague, he was close to the second guard and put the pistol to his chest, but a technical malfunction occurred in the pistol, so he was forced to flee. I tried to take the pistol from the guard I shot, but he was lying on the ground on his stomach, and I could not raise it to take the weapon. At that moment, I saw the other guard aiming the pistol at my colleague while he was fleeing, so I raised the pistol at him and shot him in the waist, then I was forced to flee.' After three months of pursuit, my colleague and I were arrested and spent 7 years in captivity.' Regarding his opinion on the effectiveness of this operation and the risk to his life, he continued: 'Yes, I was going with my friend and we risked our lives because the plan was to achieve the goal and then escape. In my opinion, this experiment did not succeed or fail. We delivered our message and as a result, a curfew was imposed for 3 days and work in the tunnels was halted for 3 days. The search for us continued for 3 months until we were arrested. At that stage, the gun had its own meaning and the bullet had its own echo, so much so that the Israeli Prime Minister at the time, Yitzhak Rabin, was the one who announced our arrest at that time. Even if we did not succeed in taking the weapon or killing the guards, these operations are not linked to the number of dead, but they had an echo and a message of resistance that as long as there is an occupation, there is a defense of the land, and there is a continuing legacy of struggle from generat ion to generation, especially in the same family.' Regarding the current popular resistance in light of the ongoing Israeli aggression on Gaza and its repercussions on the West Bank, we have witnessed another type of resistance and a new generation that witnessed difficult events and scenes from the events in Gaza that stuck in their memory, so they needed to take revenge through popular resistance. Some of them went out to the points of contact with stones, some of them were killed and others were arrested. In a special interview with the mother of the martyr (A.Kh.) in one of the camps in the West Bank about the circumstances of her son's martyrdom, she said: 'In the middle of the night, the occupation forces stormed the camp. My son was next to me that night, and I saw how eager he was to go out because he was affected by the news of the war on Gaza. I begged him not to go out because if he went out, he would not return because the snipers of the occupation soldiers were on the roofs of our neighbors' hou ses, but somehow he deceived me and went. He wanted to prevent the occupation from storming the camp. He went with the stone to defend the people of the camp, but he returned to me as a martyr.' As the aggression on the northern West Bank, Jenin and Tulkarm, continues for the fifth consecutive day, this week we have witnessed resistance operations that may take us back to the days of the Intifada, including the double Hebron operation in the Karmei Tzur settlement in Hebron, which led to the killing of the settlement guard, and the incident of the explosion of two booby-trapped vehicles near the Etzion settlement, which the Hebrew media described as an unusual incident. Following this operation, barriers were set up between Hebron and Bethlehem, and yesterday morning the army closed the Ibrahimi Mosque to Palestinian worshippers for fear of further attacks, and only Jewish worshippers were allowed in. The occupation army also announced at midnight tonight that it had seized two vehicles in the Hizma area of ??Jerusalem, in possession of explosive devices and weapons. Those inside the vehicle managed to escape. In the morning, two young men carried out a shooting attack on a police car near the Tarqumiya checkpoint west of Hebron, which led to the killing of 3 occupation officers. The perpetrators were able to withdraw, and as a result, Netanyahu cancelled his participation in the opening ceremony of the new school year at the Jerusalem School. After all these events, the Palestinian street was divided between supporters and opponents of the resistance operations. Some of them say: 'These operations, especially the 'martyrdom' ones, give the occupation an excuse to expand its incursions into the cities of the West Bank.' Some of them say: 'Resistance is a right guaranteed to any people under occupation, and peaceful resistance, such as boycotting, for example, has a global impact on the occupation, and it must be strengthened more. Israel does not need an excuse to commit any crime, but operations like these can make it easier for them to implement their plans to take revenge on our people and displace them.' Some of them support the resistance and say: 'We have no choice but to confront and resist the occupation until it leaves, because the occupation has not given us anything in peace, and settlements have increased after Oslo and settlements have reached our homes.' Some of them place the blame on the Palestinian Authority and say: 'The Palestinian people have a crisis of confidence in their leaders, and the main reason for this is the Palestinian Authority, because the outcome is different from what was expected when the people trusted the leadership and followed the path of Oslo.' The human rights activist and lawyer Farid al-Atrash shared his opinion on the resistance operations: 'What distinguishes the popular resistance in the uprising is that it was popular and involved the people in all their spectrums and had a unified national leadership with the participation of most factions. As for the current popular resistance, it is not popular and does not have a unified national leadership. Some of it is regional in some gatherings and some of it is small groups that carry out popular and peaceful resistance activities that do not affect the occupation or change its policies, although there are some positive models. Unfortunately, the parties raise the slogan of popular resistance and do not implement it on the ground. There is also a lack of trust among the people in the parties and organizations.' Source: Maan News Agency