The current unrest may recede, but more waves of protest of ever greater intensity are surely not far behind. Jafar Farah, a Palestinian leader in Israel, has warned of it heading slowly from a national conflict into a civil war, one defined by the kind of debased one-state solution Israel is imposing. The chaotic violence of the past weeks looks like a warning from the future – a future Israel is hurtling towards.
Whether the clashes in Jerusalem and the West Bank are the long-awaited “Third Intifada” is the question being asked by virtually every journalist covering the Middle East. Even among Palestinians, the answer to that question varies. Pam Bailey talks with Palestinians in Gaza, the West Bank and Lebanon and finds there is one common truth among the people on the “street”: The uprising is once again bringing them together (at least in spirit) across borders—from East Jerusalem, to Gaza City, to Beirut.