2004 - Losing leaders

Summary of the most important events of the year

 21.03.2004 - The assassination of Shaik Ahmed Yassin

 Ahmad Yassin was assassinated in an Israeli helicopter missile strike on 21 March 2004. Israeli helicopter gunships fired missiles at Hamas' spiritual leader, Shaikh Ahmed Yassin, as he left a mosque after performing the Monday dawn prayers, killing the Hamas leader and six other worshippers.

17.04.2004 - The assassination of Abdul Azziz al-Rantisi

 Rantisi was assassinated in an Israeli helicopter missile strike, as he returned from a visit to his family on 17 April 2004.

Hundreds of thousands of citizens, including prominent political figures, participated in the funeral procession of Hamas leader, Dr. Abdel Aziz Al Rantisi, and two of his bodyguards. During the procession, which started from the leader's home at the Al Sheikh Redwan suburb, citizens chanted slogans demanding revenge to Al Rantisi's killing and condemning the continuous Israeli military aggressions against the Palestinian people, as billowing banners of the different factions appeared throughout the procession. The funeral procession witnessed also a massive attendance of representatives of national and Islamic factions, who expressed the unity of the Palestinian stance in the face of the Israeli conspiracies, asserting that the resistance would continue despite the Israeli strikes.

 06.06.2004 - Marwan Al-Barghouthi jailed for life.

 On 06 Jun 2004, An Israeli court Sunday jailed Palestinian leader Marwan Al-Barghouthi for life for resisting the Israeli occupation of Palestine but he said his people's statehood quest would not be broken. Al-Barghouthi, who denied involvement in actual resistance to the Israeli occupation of his country, received another 20 years for attempted murder and a further 20 for activity in a resistance group that Israelis and their supporters call "terrorist" group - 165 years in total - in a high-profile case that Palestinians denounced as a show trial. The articulate Palestinian lawmaker, Marwan Al-Barghouthi, did not recognize the jurisdiction of the Israeli occupation court.

 15.08.2004 - Palestinian prisoner's hunger strike

 Palestinian prisoners in the Israeli jails of Sabe', Nafha, Hadarim and Shatta started an open-ended hunger strike on Sunday 15 August 2004.

They are to be joined by prisoners of the rest of Israeli jails on Wednesday 18 August 2004. On 22 August 2004 there were unwavering attempts by the Israeli prisoners' service to break the open hunger strike the Palestinian prisoners are embarking on for the eight day in row, the Al Ramlah and Hasharoon female prisons were brutally

attacked by the Israeli jailers and as the personal belongings of the detainees were seized in the notorious Israeli desert jail of Nafha. The prisoners further threatened that they would even refrain from taking medicines in the case the Israeli prisons authority went ahead with the atrocious and racist measures against the striking prisoners. On 26 August 2004 As the Palestinian political prisoners' open-ended hunger strike entered the 12th day, the Israeli occupation Prison Service used coercive measures by against the hunger-strikers, including threats, psychological and physical pressures.  

 16.10.2004 - North Gaza Strip under attack

 Israel officially ended a 17-day military operation, named Operation Days of Penitence, in the northern Gaza Strip. Operation Days of Penitence conducted between September 30, 2004 and October 15, 2004. The operation, focused on the towns of Beit Hanoun and Beit Lahia and Jabalia refugee camp. The operation resulted in the deaths of between 104 and 133 Palestinians, and 5 people on the Israeli side.

Israeli military forces demolished 77 houses and damaged hundreds more; damaged public facilities, including schools, kindergartens and mosques, and destroyed farmlands.

The attack resulted in a proposed resolution of the U.N. Security Council condemning the Israeli action, calling for Israeli withdrawal and respect for human rights of Palestinians. The resolution was vetoed by the United States on October 5.

Over the weekend of October 17, the Israeli military announced that its troops withdrew from the Jabalia refugee camp and other populated areas and redeployed to positions nearby and proclaimed the attack a success, with a warning that the troops would return if the rocket attacks resume.

11.11.2004 - Yasser Arafat Died

 Yasser Arafat dies at the age of 75 in a hospital near Paris, after a period in which he was suspected of being poisoned.