The Palestinians as Refugees - Research Paper Example

Research Paper—The Palestinians as Refugees Introduction As political powers and people withself-interests hijack human issues, the issues become more complex with passing time. This summarizes the Palestinian refugee problem. People rendered homeless have born as refugees and died in the same condition, while at least a generation has seen such crisis of identity, languishing in various camps across the Middle Eastern terrain. Many leaders have come and gone without reaching a final solution, although it looked possible through dialogue, a few times, during recent past. Arab-Israel conflict being the basis of Palestine refugee problem, the core issue remains about the “right of return” for these refugee to their land, which is now part of Israel, recognized by many countries around the globe. The return of these refugees to present Israeli territory would mean giving up the claim of having an exclusive Jewish state by Israel. In addition, there is the religious angle that has significance, when discussing the Palestinian refugee issue. As both Israeli Jews and Palestinians, mostly Muslims, have diverse religious beliefs; neither can digest the idea of Palestinians return to Israeli land, at present. While Israel accepted Jews from Russia and other countries, in huge numbers, the country is averse to accepting Palestinian refugees back. The struggle of refugees thus takes the shape of Holy war for Palestinians, as they ask for returning to their land, which is now Israel. Thesis statement The complex problem can find solution, only after the Palestinians refugees soften their adamant stand on the issue of “return back” to their homeland, which is now Israel. The age-old concept of Holy war between Muslim Arabs and Jewish Israelis will never solve this problem. Arab-Israel war After the failure of Arab world war against the establishment of Israeli state, UN took the responsibility of looking after the displaced Arabs, as a result of this war. Accordingly, United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinians Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) was established in 1949 for this purpose. However, it is a fact now that the number of such displaced persons, now Palestinian refugees, has gone up many times. While many refugees in the world would like to seek asylum and settlement in prosperous lands across the globe, the case seems to be different here. Therefore, the problem of Palestinians as refugees needs investigating from different angles. However, the solution can become visible only after considering that humanitarian issues should not be dictated by man-made dogmas like religion and politics. (Romirowsky) Origins of Palestinian refugee problem It started with the establishment of Israeli state in 1948 and subsequent Arab-Israel war. This resulted in exodus of around 700,000 Palestinians being displaced from the new state of Israel, as they sought refuge in Gaza Strip, controlled by Egypt and West Bank, controlled by Jordan, apart from lands in Syria and Lebanon. However, this was not the end. With Israeli occupation of Gaza and West Bank during June 1967, there was more displacement of Palestinians from these and territories. This added further 300,000 refugees to already existing number, which had grown in size from 1948 to 1967. The reason for this displacement has been, primarily, denial of Arab World to a UN initiated partition plan of 1947. The attack of Arab nations on the new Jewish state, immediately after its establishment in 1948 remained the main cause of the Palestinian refugee issue. While Arab nations called upon the displaced Palestinians to fight for return to their lost land, Israel countered with their claim that refugee problem is a worldwide phenomenon. Supporting this claim Israel reasoned that the country absorbed almost 60,000 Jews being displaced from various Arab nations, during the conflict, apart many Jews from Russia. Accordingly, Israel wanted Palestinian refugees to melt in their newly found territories. However, displaced Palestinians maintain that their exodus was the result of deliberate attempt by Zionists to throw them out of the Jewish state. United Nations later adopted a General Assembly Resolution # 194(iii) declaring that all refugees willing to return should be allowed to dos so, while offering proper compensation for their losses. However, in reality this had no material affect on the Palestinians refugee problem, as any attempt to allow them into Israel would mean compromising the ideology and security of Jewish state.(Brymen) This highlights the emotive and psychological issues related with Palestinian refugee problem, given the background of age-old differences between Jewish and Islamic ideologies. Dimensions of the problem Presently, Palestinians are considered stateless persons, as their identities fall into three broad categories. While they are identified as holders of “Refugee Travel Document” as issued by many Arab countries like Syria, Iraq, Egypt and Lebanon, among others, the second category belongs to holders of temporary Jordanian passports. The third category belongs to those people who have been provided Palestinian Authority passports that serve as temporary travel documents, until the full resolution of Palestinian issue. (Shiblak) The number of refugees remains a point of dispute, as Palestinians want this number to include internally displaced persons, within Israel from unrecognized villages, during 1948. This number is believed to have grown from 150,000 in 1948 to 250,000 now. Further, Palestinians also demand addition of around 400,000 displaced persons during 1967 war, to the list of refugees. In any case, Official version of Israel includes only the displaced persons at the time of 1967 war, without their descendants. Hence, the dispute remains unsolved until today. However, for official records, UNRWA, which is the registering authority for Palestinian refugees, does not recognize as refugees, the children born to mothers who have married non-refugees.(Zureik) UNRWA definition of a refugee According to this definition, a Palestinian refugee is any one who has been living in Palestine, as permanent resident, from June 1, 1946 to May 15, 1948 and has lost the residence and livelihood, as a result of 1948 Arab-Israel conflict. However, the agency later added to this list the children and grandchildren of such displaced persons. This resulted in rising numbers of refugee claims from Palestinians. The agency worked for welfare of refugees as it provided jobs, education, living facilities to the displaced people, in the direction of making their lives reasonably comfortable. However, the refugees always looked at presenting their poor state of living towards favoring their cause for getting back the land from Israel. As Arabs failed in regular warfare to break Israel, gorilla war began taking shape in these refugee camps. Many terrorist fronts, including PLO, lead by Naser Arafat started attacking Israel through dubious attacks and they used UNRWA facilities as bases for such attacks. (Bocco) UNRWA assisted Palestinians—Refugee convention Article 1D This article mainly deals with the exclusion of refugees from eligible list of protection seekers under Refugee Convention, who fall under different categories. These include persons getting protection from other agencies or organs of United Nations. Accordingly, for Palestinians, this exclusion pertains to UNRWA as being the only category, mentioned as exclusion in this convention. Hence, Palestinians are eligible for getting help and protection only from UNRWA and no other UN agency. In addition, the article 1D mandates that the cut-off date for asylum be July 28, 1951 for Palestinians who are registered with UNRWA. (UNRWA assisted) This is a legal way out for many Palestinians to seek asylum in advanced western countries like UK. However, emotive and religious issues restrict most of Palestinians from doing so. Scholarly platforms With passage of time, many intellectuals emerged after 1967 war who advocated different versions of the Palestinian refugee issue. while Institute of Palestinian Studies was established back in 1963. During 1970s and 1980s, different scholarly publications came forward in support of the Palestinian cause. Various groups like the Association of Arab-American University Graduates came out with literature that supported the Palestinian viewpoint, without referring to any other explanation about the Arab-Israel conflict. The Journal of Palestine Studies, established in 1971 provided wider platform to many pro-Palestine writers and intellectuals. (Romirowsky & Joffe) One such intellectual is Ghassan Kanafani, who was born in 1936, before the displacement of Palestinians during Arab-Israel war of 1948. However, with passage of time he too became a refugee. In many of his novels, Kanafani has detailed the humanitarian issue raised by the Palestinian refugee problem. In his story, “The Land of Sad Oranges”, the author has highlighted the emotive issue in a brilliant and touching manner, as he finds himself to be a refugee within a few minutes of driving, when he enters Siada. Raising human rights issues in many of his publications, Kanafani was regarded as a scholar in Arabic literature across the world. An Israeli Bomb planted in his car killed him on 8 July 1972. (Kanafani) Events like these have helped the emotive cause of Palestinian refugees demanding return to their homes in Israel. Nakba—the Palestinian war Disaster As described by Masalha Nur (nd), Palestinians use word “Nakba” for explaining the disasters of Arab-Israel war. The author refers to the various means used by Isrealis to ouster Palestinians even after the 1948 war, as Israel wanted to create a pure Jewish state, without any Arab. The author’s book “Catastrophe remembered” details the traumatic condition of Palestinians displaced internally throughout Israel. As they are treated second-class citizens, these unfortunate Palestinians are subject to almost daily intervention by military administration. The book deals with the details of Israeli politics in dealing with internal refugees and their indigenous resistance. This research study highlights the oral memories of “Nakba”, while identifying the resistance of internally displaced Palestinians as a “civil war” against the Israeli authorities.(Masalha) Conclusion The issue of “Palestinians as refugees” is a complex one and requires al participants to shed their orthodox viewpoints. While these refugees need to abandon their “right to Return” demand, Jewish Israel must learn to live harmoniously along side their Muslim Palestinian brothers. At the same time, Palestinian refugees cannot afford to linger on this issue by giving it a shape of holy war between Muslims and Jews. When discussing this problem, humanitarian issues should overlap all other ideologies. Time has proven that gorilla war tactics will not help solving this issue. In addition, passing the refugee status to future generations is not going to help, except getting any protection under UNRWA. Work-cited Bocco. R, , “UNRWA and the Palestinian Refugees”, Oxford Journals, Vol 28, issue 2-3 2009, web, 7 April 2015: Brymen. R, , “Palestinian Refugees”, Palistenian Refugee Research Net 1998, web, 7 April 2015: Kanafani. G , “The Land of the Sand Oranges”, Palestinian refugee publication nd, web, 7 April 2015: Masalha, Nur , “Catastrophe Remembered”, Google Books nd, web, 7 April 2015: Romirowsky, Asaf , “The real Palestinian Refugee Crisis”, The Tower Magazine, , 2014, web, 7 April 2015 Romirowsky. A & Joffe. A. H, “Religion, Politics and Origins of Palistenian Refugee relief”, Google books, nd, web, 7 April 2015 Shiblak, Abbas , “Stateless Palestinians”, PLASTINIAN DISPLACEMENT, , nd, web, 7 April 2015 “UNRWA assisted Palistenians ”, UK Govt. publication , nd, web, 7 April 2015 Zureik, Elia , “The Palestinian Refugee Problem”, Center for World Dialogue, , 2003, web, 7 April 2015 Read More