On February 8, 2005, four Middle Eastern leaders gathered for the Sharm el-Sheikh Summit, held in the namesake town on the southern tip of the Sinai Peninsula, in order to declare their wish to work towards the end of the four-year Al-Aqsa Intifada. The four were: Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon; Mahmoud Abbas, President of the Palestinian Authority; Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak; and King Abdullah II of Jordan.

Background

The Al-Aqsa Intifada, which began in October 2000, left over 5,000 Israeli and Palestinian casualties and took extensive toll on the both economies and societies. The cycle of violence persisted all through this period, except for the short-lived Hudna in the summer of 2003; neither side was willing to negotiate until fire was halted. Eventually, Yasser Arafat, the man thought by many to have engineered the Intifada and to have kept it alive through four years, passed away in November 2004; January 9, 2005's Palestinian elections left moderate Mahmoud Abbas in power. His initial efforts to bring order to the anarchy of the Palestinian territories and halt attacks against Israel caused Ariel Sharon to change his attitude towards negotiations; he ordered the significant reduction of Israeli military activity in the Palestinian territories and made for many humanitarian steps in order to help the Palestinian civilians. These trust-building steps, together with renewed security coordination between the two sides and the backing of the US, Jordan and Egypt led to the agreement on holding the summit.

The summit

The summit began in a series of meetings Sharon held with Mubarak, King Abdullah and Abbas; later on, all leaders except for the king read statements reassuring their commitment to the ceasefire and to continued efforts to stabilize the situation and to move on in the process in accordance with the Road Map.