The Right of Return, a Basic Right Still Denied
During and after the establishment of the state of Israel, almost 800,000
Palestinian refugees were created by a process that today would be called ethnic
cleansing. These refugees and their descendants are the largest and most
persistent refugee problem in the world with over 3.7 million registered by the
United Nations and about 2 million others not registered but living in countries
and regions sometimes within a very short distance of their original homes and
lands.
The international community, which recommended the partition of Palestine, felt
a deep sense of responsibility for this tragedy. Count Folke Bernadotte, the UN
Mediator stated: "It would be an offence against the principles of elemental
justice if these innocent victims of the conflict were denied the right to
return to their homes, while Jewish immigrants flow into Palestine" (UN Doc Al
648, 1948). This remains true today as any person with a Jewish religion can
gain automatic citizenship while Palestinians born in Palestine/Israel cannot
return to their homeland.
The Right of Return has a solid legal basis. The United Nations adopted
Resolution 194 on December 11, 1948. Paragraph 11 states: "...the refugees
wishing to return to their homes and live at peace with their neighbors should
be permitted to do so at the earliest practicable date... compensation should be
paid for the property of those choosing not to return." Resolution 194 was
affirmed practically every year since with a universal consensus, except for
Israel and the U.S. This resolution is further clarified by UN General Assembly
Resolution 3236 which reaffirms in Subsection 2, "the inalienable right of the
Palestinians to return to their homes and property from which they have been
displaced and uprooted, and calls for their return". Hindering return is an act
of aggression which deserves condemnation and/or action by the Security Council.
Liability for consequences of violation remains with Israel. UN partition
resolution 181 and Israel's later admission to the UN were conditional on
acceptance of relevant UN resolutions including 194.
The Right of Return does not derive its validity merely from UN Resolutions. The
Universal Declaration of Human Rights article 13 reaffirms the right of every
individual to leave and return to his country. Moreover, the Principle of Self
Determination guarantees, inter alia, the right of ownership and domicile in
one's own country. This principle was adopted by the UN in 1947. In 1969 and
thereafter, it was explicitly applied to the Palestinian People, including "the
legality of the Peoples' struggle for Self-Determination and liberation", (GAOR
2535 (xxiv), 2628 (xxv), 2672 (xxv), 2792 (xxvi)). International law demands
that neither occupation nor sovereignty diminish the rights of private
ownership. When the Ottomans surrendered in 1920, Palestinian ownership of the
land was maintained. The land and property of "the refugees" remains their own
and they are entitled to return to it.
Research not only shows that the right of the refugees is sacred and legal but
also possible (i.e. it is a myth that Israelis would have to be displaced to
allow for the return of the refugees). A study on the demography of Israel shows
that 78% of Israelis are living in 14 percent of Israel and that the remaining
86% of the land in Israel is mostly land that belongs to the refugees on which
22% of the Israelis live. However, 20% live in city centers, which are mostly
Palestinian such as, Beer Al Saba', Ashdod, Majdal, Asqalan, Nazareth, Haifa,
Acre, Tiberias and Safad. As for the remaining 20%, they live in kibbutzes and
moshavs. They control the legacy and heritage of five million Palestinian
refugees. Is there any logic to having 2,400 refugees on one square kilometer in
the Gaza Strip while any one of them could look over the barbed wire and see his
land practically empty? If Gaza refugees returned to their homes in southern
Palestine, no more than five percent of Jews in the center would be affected. If
the refugees of Lebanon returned to their homes in the Galilee no more than one
percent of Jews in the center would be affected. The total number of refugees
from Gaza and Lebanon equals the number of Russian immigrants who came to Israel
in the '90s to live in the homes of these refugees. What right brings in Russian
Jews and what kind of peace deprives Palestinian refugees the right to return
home?
According to a report by Amnesty International last December, 2650 Palestinian
houses have been destroyed since 1987 by Israel in the West Bank, including east
Jerusalem, on the pretext of not having building permission. Further thousands
of acres owned by Palestinians have been confiscated to build settlements in the
occupied territories in contraventions to the 4th Geneva convention Article 49
stating that the "Occupying Power shall not transfer parts of its own civilian
population into the territory it occupies." The AI report is available at:
http://www.web.amnesty.org/ai.nsf/index/MDE150591999
The inalienable rights of refugees cannot be left to "negotiations" between
Israel and the Palestinian authority. International law considers agreements
between an occupier and any body in occupied areas to be null and void if they
deprive civilians of recognized human rights including the rights to
repatriation and restitution. No peace will be durable without solving the
refugee situation regardless of agreements signed between a strong party
(Israel) and a weak and unrepresentative one (Yasser Arafat).
The US is bound by its constitution to support human rights and freedom. There
is no more elemental right than one's right to his/her home and to live in
his/her land. The US could use the massive financial support we give to the
State of Israel to press for this right.
Source:
http://al-awda.org/factsheet.htm
Related links:
Destroyed Palestinian villages:
http://www.birzeit.edu/crdps/village.html
Palestine Remembered:
http://www.palestineremembered.com/
Americans against Zionist oppression and occupation - Articles:
http://ourworld.cs.com/nonzion/id2.htm
Censored video of the Israeli army in action:
http://cbc.ca/clips/ram-lo/macdonald_censored020318.ram
Truth about the Middle-East:
http://www.cactus48.com/truth.html
Language of the Middle-East:
http://reese.king-online.com/Reese_20020415/index.php
Occupied Palestine and the Politics of Terrorism:
http://www.mediamonitors.net/mosaddeq34.html
Zionism and it's impact:
http://www.ummah.com/waragainstislam/impact.htm
It’s the occupation, stupid:
http://www.ummah.com/waragainstislam/occupation.htm
The Blood on Israel's hands - When war criminals play the victim, and the world
nods in agreement:
http://www.mediamonitors.net/mosaddeq24.html
Israeli Terrorism doesn't make News - Cause of The Conflict Ignored:
http://www.mediamonitors.net/mosaddeq22.html
Quest for justice:
http://www.ummah.com/waragainstislam/quest.htm
Zionist Terrorism - Some historic facts:
http://www.ummah.com/waragainstislam/terrorism.htm
A Jew seeking justice:
http://www.commondreams.org/views02/0321-05.htm