March and April 2002 saw a dramatic increase in attacks against Israelis by Palestinian militants such as Hamas, Islamic Jihad and the Fatah-affiliated Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades.

The stated goals of the operation (as conveyed to the Israeli Knesset by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon on April 8, 2002) were: to catch and arrest terrorists and, primarily, their dispatchers and those who finance and support them; to confiscate weapons intended to be used against Israeli citizens; to expose and destroy facilities and explosives, laboratories, weapons production factories and secret installations.

The orders are clear: target and paralyze anyone who takes up weapons and tries to oppose our troops, resists them or endangers them—and to avoid harming the civilian population.

IDF officers also noted that incursions would force Palestinian militants "to exert their energy by defending their homes in the camps instead of by plotting attacks on Israelis.

"[13] The Palestinian attachment to the UN report on Operation Defensive Shield challenged the validity of the Israeli claim that it was targeting "terrorists," noting that,[8] [...] the record shows clearly that the nature of the actions taken, the amount of harm inflicted on the population and the practical results prove completely different political goals [...] the Israeli occupying forces have consistently targeted the Palestinian police and security forces, instead of "terrorists", and have consistently tried to destroy the Palestinian Authority and declared it an "enemy", instead of groups hostile to peace in the Middle East.Operation Defensive Shield was announced on March 29, but it is widely assumed preparations began nearly a month before.

Claims of complete destruction of the Jenin refugee camp, a massacre of 500 civilians, and mass graves being dug by Israeli soldiers were proven false after a United Nations investigation.

Clashes took place around refugee camps, and Israeli attack helicopters fired rockets at Palestinian positions in the main square and neighboring streets.

The Golani Brigade entered the Casbah, engaging the Palestinians in heavy street combat and using armored bulldozers and Achzarit APCs to clear away barricades.

In response to the IDF offensive hundreds of Bethelemites including Bethlehem's Governor sought refuge in the church, the helicopters of the Shaldag unit arriving half an hour too late.

[29][30] On April 3 the IDF laid siege to the church surrounding it with an elite paratrooper brigade specializing in sniper operations who used tactics including carrying out simulated attacks.

[31] The Vatican's top foreign policy expert Archbishop Jean-Louis Taura stated that while the Palestinians have joined the Vatican in bilateral agreements where they have undertaken to respect and maintain the status quo regarding Christian holy places and the rights of Christian communities, "to explain the gravity of the current situation, let me begin with the fact that the occupation of the holy places by armed men is a violation of a long tradition of law that dates back to the Ottoman era.

The IDF arrested more than 700 people, among them Marwan Barghouti, a top Palestinian militant leader suspected of directing numerous suicide bombings and other attacks against Israelis.

Shin Bet asked Jibril Rajoub, head of the Preventive Security Force, to point out which men were police officers and which were fugitives.

In many instances, humanitarian workers were not able to reach people in need to assess conditions and deliver necessary assistance because of the sealing of cities, refugee camps and villages during the operation.

[37] On April 4, gendarmes from an Israel Border Police undercover unit surrounded a house in Hebron where a member of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades who supplied weapons to militants was holed up, along with his brother.

[8] However, the human rights group B'Tselem only registered 240 Palestinians killed by Israeli security forces in the West Bank during the period in which the operation took place.

[43] Beverly Milton-Edwards, Professor of Politics at Queen's University in Belfast, writes that while aspects of Palestinian terrorism were reduced after the operation, Israel's objective of ending the Al-Aqsa Intifada remained unmet.

Milton-Edwards concludes that, "The unequivocal victory [sought by Israel] eventually remained elusive and the Israelis and Palestinians resumed a variety of forms of low intensity warfare with each other.

"[44] A UN fact-finding mission was established under UN Security Council Resolution 1405 (April 19, 2002) into Operation Defensive Shield following Palestinian charges that a massacre had occurred in Jenin, which later proved to be false.

[2] Human Rights Watch determined that "Israeli forces committed serious violations of international humanitarian law, some amounting prima facie to war crimes.

"[46] Scholars have noted "the Israeli military systematically destroy[ing] West Bank infrastructure, including roads, water-treatment and power-generating plants, and telecommunications facilities, as well as official database and documents" during the Operation.

While denying that such destruction was systematic, the Israeli Defence Forces have admitted that their personnel engaged in some acts of vandalism, and are carrying out some related prosecutions.

[48][49][50] Amira Hass, an Israeli reporter for Haaretz, criticized the IDF for targeting computer files and printed records, dubbing the offensive "Operation Destroy the Data".

[52] Human Rights Watch found no evidence to sustain claims of massacres or large-scale extrajudicial executions by the IDF in Jenin refugee camp.

)[citation needed] Initially Israel welcomed an investigation, announcing that it would cooperate fully with the Secretary General's fact-finding effort.

According to the United Jewish Communities, Israel made a number of points regarding the team's methodology, in order to "safeguard the impartiality of its work.

"[54] However, Israeli government receptivity to cooperating with the UN fact-finding mission decreased when the Secretary-General of the United Nations, Kofi Annan, did not appoint a predominantly technical team with specialized military and forensic expertise, but rather political-administrative figures without such specialized skills (including Cornelio Sommaruga, controversial for previous "Red Swastika" remarks),[55] and after Palestinian officials reduced the casualty toll in Jenin on May 1, 2002[56] to be between 50 and 60 deaths while Israel maintained there were only seven or eight civilian casualties.

"The smell of decomposing bodies hung over at least six heaps of rubble today, and weeks of excavation may be needed before an accurate death toll can be made.

"[57]Stewart Bell of the National Post on the April 15 reported that Ahmed Tibi, an Arab member of the Israeli Knesset, said he had met hundreds of Palestinians displaced by what he termed the "massacre" in Jenin.

One such rumor was a grocery store owner near Jenin who spoke of seeing Israeli troops using a refrigerated truck to hold the bodies of massacred Palestinians, which he said was still parked on a nearby hill.