By now it is impossible to ignore. Tires are burning. Rocks are being thrown. Tear gas is sprayed, and the term “intifada” is getting tossed around. Everywhere people are saying that the current wave of unrest in the region will lead to a third intifada. They have been saying it — and worrying about it — for months.

Clashed erupted again last weekend throughout the West Bank, just like they did the weekend before. Thousands of Palestinians took to the streets to express their solidarity with Palestinians prisoners on hunger strike in Israeli prisons. But what started as organized demonstrations on Friday [Feb. 22] after the prayer in the mosques, took upon a more significant meaning with the arrival of the news of the death of a Palestinian prisoner, Arafat Jaradat. Jaradat died at the Israeli prison of Megido. He was not a hunger striker, and the reasons for his death are now being investigated. But there is no doubt that this event contributed to further fuel the fire. Hundreds of Palestinians demonstrated by his village Sair near Hebron, and confronted Israeli soldiers. Hebron became a sensitive hotspot mainly due to the ongoing confrontations between the Jewish settlers living in the midst of the Palestinian population. Some of them are ready to employ any possible means to enrage their Palestinian neighbors. For example, at the traditional Purim carnival parade, one of the Jewish settlers disguised himself as a Palestinian prisoner, as if the issue is not but the most sensitive one, as far as Palestinians are concerned. 

Another hot spot this weekend, probably the most sensitive of all, is the Temple Mount. This is where the Second Intifada erupted on that fateful Friday more than twelve years ago [September 2000], immediately after the [former Prime Minister] Ariel Sharon, in his role as head of the opposition, made his well-publicized visit to the site. Last Friday, Border Patrol forces burst into the Temple Mount compound to the sound of the muezzin’s call to prayer at the al-Aqsa Mosque. They were trying to stop a hail of stones pummeling Jewish worshippers at the Western Wall below. 

There is no question that “the region is seething.” The fate of the hunger strikers in Israeli prisons is now the most volatile issue of all for the Palestinian people, regardless of their political affiliation. It is also the one issue that unites them. Palestinian prisoners are perceived as terrorists by large segments of the Israeli population, regardless of their political affiliations. What these people don’t realize, however, is that Palestinians view these prisoners very differently. As far as they are concerned, all these prisoners, without exception, benefit from having engaged in tadhiya, or “sacrifice.” In other words, they have sacrificed their lives on behalf of the Palestinian people’s struggle. They have abandoned their own, personal interests and volunteered to fight against the Israeli occupation. It is in the name of these prisoners that the people have taken to the street, though to be fair, there are plenty of other reasons that could motivate these thousands of Palestinian demonstrators to set the West Bank on fire. One need only consider the economic situation, staggering unemployment, clashes with settlers, and an assortment of local issues, such as the closure of Shuhada Street in Hebron.