The Return of the Rejectionists

At the core of the initial opposition to the Oslo Accord and the ongoing peace process was a refusal to ditch ideological ‘truths’ and compromise. In Israel, the rejectionists comprised the national religious, led by the settlers, and the security-conscious members of the Right. Amongst the Palestinians, the Islamists reiterated their belief that the Jews did not have a right to national self-determination and therefore they could never accept a two-state solution. Their opposition to Oslo was supported by the secular nationalists of the PFLP, the DFLP, Fatah's Tanzim and other groups who wished to reverse the outcome of the 1948 war by continuing the armed struggle. On the northern border Iran, freed from the decade-long war with Iraq, encouraged Hezbollah to implement cross-border attacks to kill and abduct Israeli soldiers as a means of disrupting the evolving peace process.

The Oslo Accord and the decision to participate in negotiations and diplomacy left an ideological vacuum which Hamas and Islamic Jihad willingly filled. The abandonment of the revolutionary road of armed struggle was a dramatic and indeed abrupt change for many Palestinians. Most of the organizations on the PLO Executive refused to join the Palestine Authority.