⁍ Israel credits the barrier with having stemmed Palestinian suicide bombings and shooting attacks during the five-year intifada.

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⁍ Palestinians say it was a land grab that cuts miles into the West Bank and was designed to annex parts of the territory that Israel captured and occupied in the 1967 Middle East war.

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⁍ The International Court of Justice in The Hague ruled in an advisory opinion in 2004 that the barrier was illegal under international law.

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– Today is the 20th anniversary of the Palestinian uprising known as the Second Palestinian Intifada, or Intifada, and the first intifada that began on Sept. 28, 2000, when then-Israeli leader Ariel Sharon visited a disputed holy site in Jerusalem—now known to Muslims as al-Haram al-Sharif (Noble Sanctuary) and to Jews as the Temple Mount. Palestinians viewed Sharon’s visit as a calculated provocation, but Israel accused Yasser Arafat of inciting violence—two months after a failed peace summit in the United States. Palestinians signaled they would accept nothing less than a viable state in what is now Israeli-occupied territory with its capital in East Jerusalem, while many Israelis concluded that they had no ‘partner for peace,’ Reuters reports. Since the uprising began, Israel has built a West Bank barrier that Palestinians say is a land grab designed to annex parts of the territory that Israel captured and occupied in the 1967 Middle East war, and which Palestinians seek for a future state. The International Court of Justice in 2004 ruled in an advisory opinion that the barrier was illegal under international law. Israel rejected this, accusing the court of being “politically motivated.” While West Bank Palestinians could before 2000 easily walk or drive into Israel, a generation later, some Israelis are now most likely to encounter them while serving as soldiers at a checkpoint—unless they are among the 450,000 Israelis now living in West Bank settlements. And from border communities such as Nitsanei Oz just inside Israel, miles of fencing, walls, and watchtowers.