Learn about the history of the Palestinian struggle for freedom, equality and justice by exploring major events in the history of their oppression on this day of the year.
28 September
ISRAELI AL AQSA PROVOCATION STARTS INTIFADA
On this day in 2000, Ariel Sharon, heavily guarded by Israeli soldiers and policemen, walked in to al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem in order to provoke an angry reaction from the Palestinian Muslim population. As was planned, fighting broke out between the unarmed Palestinians defending al-Aqsa and Sharon’s heavily armed soldiers and police. Seven Palestinians were killed in the fighting and thus began the second Intifada - the al-Aqsa intifada. The background was rising awareness that the Oslo accords were a dead end.
الاستفزاز الإسرائيلي تجاه الأقصى سبب الانتفاضة
سبتمبر28
في مثل هذا اليوم من عام 2000، دخل أرييل شارون، تحت حراسة مشددة من قبل الجنود ورجال الشرطة الإسرائيليين، إلى المسجد الأقصى في القدس من أجل إثارة رد فعل غاضب من السكان المسلمين الفلسطينيين. وكما هو مخطط، اندلع اشتباك بين الفلسطينيين العزل الذين يدافعون عن الأقصى وجنود وشرطة شارون المدججين بالسلاح. قُتل سبعة فلسطينيين برصاص الجنود، وترتب على ذك انطلاقة الانتفاضة الثانية - انتفاضة الأقصى. على خلفية هذا الحدث ازداد الادراك بأن اتفاقيات أوسلو وصلت الى طريق مسدود.
On the 28th of September of the year 2000, Ariel Sharon, heavily guarded by policemen and soldiers, stormed Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in occupied Jerusalem, provoking a Palestinian uprising that was later known as the Second Intifada or the Al-Aqsa Intafada. The uprising lasted five years and left over 3,000 Palestinians and 1,000 Israelis killed.
Prior to Sharon’s move, tensions had risen against the backdrop of the failed Camp David talks, when late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak failed to come to a peace agreement due to disagreements over the status of Jerusalem and the right of return for Palestinian refugees.
The invasion was met with widespread outrage by Palestinians who had just marked the anniversary of the Sabra and Shatila Massacre, for which Sharon was found responsible for failing to stop the bloodshed. Palestinians were also deeply frustrated over the ongoing Israeli occupation, which once again peace talks had failed to resolve.
The BBC coverage ran under a headline with 'provocative' in inverted commas. The BBC would never call the storming of the mosque provocative: 
2000: 'Provocative' mosque visit sparks riots
The second intifada, a five-year period of conflict, erupted after Ariel Sharon, then opposition leader of the Likud party, visited the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, Islam’s third holiest site, in Jerusalem’s Old City accompanied by 1,000 Israeli police officers on September 28, 2000. More than 700 Palestinian children died at the hands of Israeli forces and settlers between September 2000 and February 2005, according to Defense for Children International - Palestine research