What was the Sabra and Shatila massacre?

• The Sabra and Shatila massacre was a massacre of up to 3,500 Palestinian refugees by Israel’s proxy militia, the Phalange, during Israel’s invasion of Lebanon in 1982. The horrific slaughter prompted outrage and condemnation around the world, with the United Nations General Assembly condemning it as “an act of genocide.”

Why is it important?

• Zionist militias and the new Israeli army committed dozens of massacres of Palestinians before, during, and after Israel’s establishment in 1948, but Sabra and Shatila marked a new level of brutality in Israel’s decades-long war on the Palestinian people and the Palestinian national liberation movement.
• The lack of accountability for those responsible, most notably Israeli Defense Minister Ariel Sharon, who would go on to become prime minister, contributed to a sense of impunity among Israeli leaders that in the ensuing decades would fuel more extreme Israeli oppression of the Palestinians and a downward spiral of violence in the region.
• For Palestinians, the Sabra and Shatila massacre was and remains a traumatic event, commemorated annually, a powerful reminder of the vulnerability of millions of stateless Palestinians and the dangers they continue to face living under Israel’s apartheid regime and in exile across the region.

What happened? 

• In June 1982, Israel launched a massive invasion of Lebanon, spearheaded by Defense Minister Sharon. The notorious hardliner Sharon wanted to destroy the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), the internationally-recognized representative of the Palestinian people, which was based in Lebanon at the time.
• The Israeli military advanced all the way to the capital of Beirut, laying siege to and ferociously bombarding the western part of the city, where the PLO was headquartered and the Palestinian refugee camp of Shatila and the adjacent neighborhood of Sabra are located. Under a ceasefire deal negotiated by the administration of US President Ronald Reagan, the PLO evacuated Lebanon by early September with written assurances from the US that the hundreds of thousands of Palestinian civilians they were leaving behind would be safe.
• On September 14, the leader of Israel's proxy Lebanese militia, the Phalange, was assassinated after being elected president of Lebanon by parliament in a move orchestrated by Sharon and Israel’s occupying army. His death was a severe blow to Sharon’s plan to install a Christian puppet regime in Lebanon that would do Israel’s bidding. The next day, the Israeli military broke the ceasefire agreement and invaded West Beirut, surrounding Sabra camp and Shatila.
• On September 16, the Israeli army sent about 150 Phalangist fighters into Sabra and Shatila, ostensibly to root out any remaining PLO fighters. The Phalange, known for their brutality and history of atrocities against Palestinian civilians, were bitter enemies of the PLO and its Lebanese allies during the Lebanese civil war. The Phalangists believed, wrongly, that their leader had been assassinated by a Palestinian.
• Over the next day and a half, the Phalangists murdered as many as 3,500 people, mostly Palestinians but also some Lebanese, most of them women, children, and the elderly, Many of the victims were raped and mutilated.
• Almost immediately after the killing began, Israeli soldiers surrounding Sabra and Shatila became aware that civilians were being murdered but did nothing to stop it. Instead, the Israeli military fired flares into the night sky to illuminate the darkness for the Phalangists, allowed more Phalangist fighters to enter the area on the second day, and supplied bulldozers that were used to dispose of the bodies of many of the victims.
• The Phalangists finally left Sabra and Shatila on the morning of September 18, taking many of the surviving men with them for interrogation at a soccer stadium. The interrogations were carried out with Israeli intelligence agents, who handed many of the captives back to the Phalange. Some of the men returned to the Phalange were later found executed.

How many people were killed?

• There is no accurate total for the number of victims because many of them were buried in mass graves by the Phalange and there has been no political will on the part of the Lebanese government to investigate.
• In her book, Sabra and Shatila: September 1982, Palestinian journalist and historian Bayan Nuwayhed al-Hout documented at least 1,300 named victims and estimated a maximum of 3,500 people were killed.
• The Palestinian Red Crescent estimated that more than 2,000 people were killed.
• In his book, Sabra & Shatila: Inquiry into a Massacre, Israeli journalist Amnon Kapeliouk, concluded a maximum of 3,000 to 3,500 people were killed.
• On the low end, the official Israeli commission of inquiry said between 700 and 800 people were killed.

Who was responsible?

• While the Phalange carried out the massacre, they were an Israeli proxy, armed and funded by Israel. Israel’s occupying army was in full control of Sabra and Shatila and sent the Phalangist fighters into the camp knowing full well their hatred of the PLO and history of atrocities against Palestinian civilians.
• In particular, Defense Minister Sharon bore responsibility for the massacre. He planned and initiated Israel’s unprovoked invasion of Lebanon, cultivated the Phalange as an Israeli proxy, and did nothing to stop the massacre when told about it until forced to by the Reagan administration.
• On September 17, an Israeli journalist in Lebanon called Sharon to inform him of reports that a massacre was taking place in Sabra and Shatila. The journalist later recalled:

“I found [Sharon] at home sleeping. He woke up and I told him ‘Listen, there are stories about killings and massacres in the camps. A lot of our officers know about it and tell me about it, and if they know it, the whole world will know about it. You can still stop it.’ I didn't know that the massacre actually started 24 hours earlier. I thought it started only then and I said to him ‘Look, we still have time to stop it. Do something about it.’ He didn't react."

• On September 18, American Envoy Morris Draper sent a furious message to Sharon declaring: “You must stop the massacres. They are obscene. I have an officer in the camp counting the bodies. You ought to be ashamed. The situation is rotten and terrible. They are killing children. You are in absolute control of the area, and therefore responsible for the area.”
• Sharon claimed later that he couldn’t have known the Phalange would harm Palestinian civilians but the day before the massacre began Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin told a US envoy that Israel had to break the ceasefire agreement and occupy West Beirut, "Otherwise, there could be pogroms [by the Phalange against Palestinian civilians].” Israeli army Chief of Staff Rafael Eitan told US officials it was "to prevent a Phalangist frenzy of revenge."
• Following international outrage, the Israeli government established a committee of inquiry, the Kahan Commission. It concluded Sharon bore "personal responsibility" for the massacre.

Why was no one ever held accountable?

• Although the Kahan Commission found that Sharon was personally responsible, it only recommended he lose his post of defense minister. Begin removed Sharon as defense minister but he remained in cabinet as a minister without portfolio and would go on to hold numerous other cabinet positions in subsequent governments, including foreign minister (1998-99) during Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's first term. In 2001, he was elected prime minister.
• In 2001, lawyers for 23 survivors of the massacre initiated legal proceedings against Sharon in a Belgian court under a law allowing people to be prosecuted for war crimes committed anywhere in the world. Under pressure from the administration of US President George W. Bush, the Belgian parliament amended and then repealed the law causing the charges against Sharon to be dismissed. In 2006, Sharon suffered a stroke, remaining in a coma until passing away in 2014.
• In January 2002, Phalangist leader and chief liaison to Israel during the 1982 invasion, Elie Hobeika, was assassinated by a car bomb in Beirut. Hobeika led the Phalangist fighters who committed the massacre and had announced that he was prepared to testify against Sharon, who was then prime minister, at a possible war crimes trial in Belgium. Hobeika's killers were never brought to justice but Lebanese officials said they believed Israel was responsible, and Israel and Sharon had a long history of using car bombs to carry out assassinations in Lebanon.

Go deeper

• Quick Facts: Palestinian Refugees
• Quick Facts: The Palestinian Nakba (“Catastrophe”)
• Explainer: The Deir Yassin Massacre
• Fact Sheet: Is Israel an Apartheid State?