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Uprising Entes Second Year with Strikes and Heavy Violence

December 12, 1988
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The Palestinian uprising, known as the intifada, entered its second year this weekend with violence as unremitting as that which ignited it 12 months ago.

It flared in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, where it started on Dec. 9, 1987.

But some of the worst confrontations in recent months occurred Saturday and Sunday in East Jerusalem.

Two Palestinians, a teen-ager and a 40-year-old man, were killed Saturday by Israel Defense Force soldiers in the Gaza Strip. At least 12 were wounded in various incidents in both territories, according to the IDF.

There were general strikes, commercial strikes and new curfews enforced. Public transportation was at a standstill. Nevertheless, the civil administration went ahead with plans to reopen junior high schools in the territories on Sunday.

Some 70,000 pupils returned to classes after an enforced absence of five months, when the schools were shut down because of rioting.

Violence broke out in several parts of East Jerusalem Saturday. The most serious disturbance took place outside Red Cross headquarters in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood.

About 200 demonstrators hurled rocks and bottles at passing vehicles, overturned trash cans and blocked the road to Mount Scopus.

Police fired tear gas and rubber bullets. Twenty-five Arab youths were arrested.

Trouble also erupted in the usually quiet Bedouin village of Ibtin, near Haifa.

The new mosque was set on fire, apparently by Jewish extremists who believed rumors that several villagers had been arrested on suspicion of terrorist acts.

The Religious Affairs Ministry promised to make good the losses, estimated at tens of thousands of dollars.

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