David’s Harp / Three intifadas and you’re out - Israel News | Haaretz Daily Newspaper
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Are we on the verge of a Third Intifada? The upsurge in violence over the last few days in response to the death of the Palestinian detainee Arafat Jaradat and to the shooting of a Kfar Kusra resident probably by settlers has touched off a wavelet of protests that are now being portrayed as a possible precursor to large-scale rebellion.
The science of predicting revolutions and other political upheavals has a worse track record than economics has on predicting recessions and depressions. The Middle East looked ripe for revolution at the end of 2010 when the street vendor Mohamed Bouazizi set himself ablaze in the Tunisian town of Sidi Bouzid. But it also looked just as ready five or 10 years ago, and when the time finally came, it’s not clear why the Libyan leader went down while in Algeria next door, the government is still in power. For that matter, it’s not clear why the Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank didn’t themselves rise up.