Gaza-Jericho Agreement

Summary

The agreement concluded in Cairo on 4 May 1994 by Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Chairman Yasir Arafat, implementing the Declaration of Principles on Interim Self-Government Arrangements through Israel’s initial troop withdrawals from the Gaza Strip and the Jericho area and the first transfer of authority to the Palestinians, ushering in the five-year transitional period (Origins and Evolution of the Palestine Problem: Part V (1989-2000), PDF p.54-55).

The run-up was punctuated by the Hebron massacre of February 1994 and by attacks in Israel including a suicide operation in the first half of April 1994, after which Israel adopted tight closures considered by the Palestinians and the international community as collective punishment; Rabin refused to remove the Israeli settlers from Hebron (Origins and Evolution of the Palestine Problem: Part V (1989-2000), PDF p.54).
It provided for the Palestinians’ first ever assumption of self-government, a 24-member Palestinian Authority with legislative and executive powers, and a Palestinian police force of up to 9,000 officers; Israel’s redeployment began on 17 May 1994 and by 18 May its partial withdrawal from the Gaza Strip was complete, with an estimated 4,000 soldiers remaining in settlement, military and security-zone areas comprising about 35 per cent of the land (Origins and Evolution of the Palestine Problem: Part V (1989-2000), PDF p.55).
It had been due within two months of the Declaration’s entry into force (13 December 1993) and was signed some five months later than planned, after differences over the size of the Jericho area, border-post jurisdiction and settler security (Origins and Evolution of the Palestine Problem: Part V (1989-2000), PDF p.54-55).
The Paris Protocol was incorporated into it in 1994, and it was superseded by the Interim Agreement of 1995 (Origins and Evolution of the Palestine Problem: Part V (1989-2000), PDF p.56, 71).