Though notables play a key role, peasants formed the core of the insurgency, and attacked cities like Jerusalem. One consequence was that they also engaged in extensive plundering and assaults on local Jewish and Christian minorities, and fellow Muslims.[8][9] One of the key centers of rebellion was in the central hilly regions of Nablus, Jerusalem and Hebron. Hebron had suffered from Ibrahim Pasha's exactions: in the preceding year, under a rule imposing the conscription of one fifth of the male population, 500 Hebronites were drafted into the Egyptian army, on the grounds that they were needed to fight ‘the Nazarene nations’.[10]