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Right of Return: Joint Parliamentary Middle East Councils Commission

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Right of Return: Joint Parliamentary Middle East Councils Commission 1 2 RIGHT OF RETURN Joint Parliamentary Middle East Councils Commission of Enquiry — Palestinian Refugees Published by Labour Middle East Council, Conservative Middle East Council, Liberal Democrat Middle East Council. London, March 2001 3 Table of Contents Map of 1947 Mandatory Palestine ................................................................................. 2 Preface by Professor Richard Falk .................................................................................. 6 Introduction by Ernie Ross, Chair of the Commission ............................................ 9 Historical Context of the Palestinian Refugees ......................................................... 10 Main Findings from the Refugees’ Testimony .......................................................... 16 General Remarks and Analysis ..................................................................................... 23 Recommendations by the Commission of Enquiry ............................................... 27 The Establishment and Procedures of the Commission of Enquiry ................ 30 A Note on the Material ..................................................................................................... 33 Evidence West Bank & Gaza................................................................................................................. 34 Jordan..................................................................................................................................... 98 Syria....................................................................................................................................... 128 Lebanon................................................................................................................................ 162 Annexes Concept Paper...................................................................................................................... 210 Questions to Refugees........................................................................................................ 215 United Nations Resolution 194 of 1948.......................................................................... 216 Acknowledgements ........................................................................................................ 220 4 This Report is dedicated to the children we met at Miya Miya Refugee Camp in Sidon on 10th September 2000, and the dreams which they shared with us. It is also dedicated to the lost dreams of the children of Tal al-Za’tar camp, 1976, and of Sabra and Shatila camps, 1982. 5 Preface Despite such astonishing realities as that two thirds of all Palestinians are cur- rently refugees, have endured such humiliation for more than 50 years, and most often live in appalling circumstances of deprivation and danger, most informed observers of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process continue to believe that the refugee issue is of trivial relevance. As the testimonies in this moving report make vividly clear, the refugee consciousness is unified behind the idea that “a right of return”, as guaranteed by the United Nations and by international law, is indispensable to any prospect of reconciliation between the two peoples who have been for so long at war with one another. Once this right is acknowledged by Israel in a manner that includes an apology for a cruel dynamic of dispossession in 1948, Palestinian refugees seem consis- tently prepared to adapt to the intervening realities, including the existence of Israel as a sovereign, legitimate state. But to pretend that peace and reconcil- iation can proceed behind the backs of the refugees is to perpetuate a cruel hoax, inevitably leading to a vicious cycle of false expectations and shattered hopes. The collapse of the Oslo process is an occasion for grave concern about the future, but also a moment that encourages reflection on what went wrong and why. The clarity of international law and morality, as pertaining to Palestinian refugees, is beyond any serious question. It needs to be appreciated that the obstacles to implementation are exclusivelypolitical — the resistance of Israel, and the unwillingness of the international community, especially the Western liberal democracies, to exert significant pressure in support of these Palestinian refugee rights. It is important to grasp the depth of Israeli resist- ance, which is formulated in apocalyptic language by those in the main- stream, and even by those who situate themselves within the dwindling Israeli peace camp. On a recent visit to Jerusalem, I heard Israelis say over and again that it would be “suicide” for Israel to admit a Palestinian right of return, that no country could be expected to do that. A perceptive Israeli intellectual told me that the reason Israel was uncomfortable with any mention of human rights was that it inevitably led to the refugee issue, with a legal and moral logic that generated an unacceptable political outcome. How to overcome this abyss is a challenge that should haunt the political imagination of all those genuinely committed to finding a just and sustainable reconciliation between Israel and Palestine. Given these tragically still distant horizons of peace, the current daily ordeal of the refugees is worthy of urgent attention, and presents interna- tional society with opportunities to mitigate suffering without addressing the fundamental challenge relating to the destiny of the Palestinian refugees. It should be realised that for all this period UNRWAhas been performing human- itarian miracles, often with insufficient budgetary support and under difficult and dangerous operating condition, especially in the refugee camps located in Gaza, the West Bank, and Lebanon. But UNRWAis limited in its mandate to the provision of relief, making it unable to extend protectionto the refugees and their communities. Nearly 20 years ago, when I was in Beirut as part of the Sean MacBride Commission of Enquiry into the Israeli Invasion of 1982, and again this month during a trip to the West Bank and Gaza as a member of a three-person delegation appointed by the UNHuman Rights Commission, 6 I was struck by the terrible vulnerability of the Palestinian refugee communi- ties. When UNRWAwas established in 1949, the protection role for Palestinian refugees was entrusted to a different body, the United Nations Conciliation Commission for Palestine (UNCCP). But UNCCP, while still formally in existence, has been a ghost organisation from its inception: inoperative, without a budg- et, essentially defunct. Because a special regime to ensure “heightened pro- tection” (General Assembly Resolution 194) had been established to address the Palestinian refugee ordeal, Palestinians alone among the refugees in the world are outside the protective framework of the United Nations High Commission for Refugees. Despite this institutional gap having existed for decades, the anomalous vulnerability of Palestinian refugees persists to this day. It should not. According to Article 1D of the 1951 Convention Relative to the Status of Refugees, which expressly decrees that when a special arrangement for the protection of refugees “has ceased for any reason”, then coverage under the normal UNHCRframework should be established. One concrete step of defi- nite benefit to Palestinian refugees, especially those subject to Israeli security arrangements, is for the international community, via the UN General Assembly, to insist explicitly and formally that these refugees be entitled to UNHCRprotection. Such a step should be coordinated with a reaffirmation of and enhanced funding for UNRWA’s humanitarian relief role. Given the clo- sures, shellings and hardships being currently experienced by Palestinian refugees in Gaza and the West Bank, this overdue adjustment should be viewed from the perspective of responding to an ongoing humanitarian catastrophe. Sustaining Palestinian identity during this period of displacement is fragile, and of utmost importance. Undoubtedly, one of UNRWA’s greatest contribu- tions is to have maintained such comprehensive records over the years in the form of Family Files, which are sadly crumbling, but which document the dis- placed personal realities for more than 700,000 Palestinian families. These files tell many stories that need to be preserved as a vital part of Palestinian historical memory, providing the basis for a national archive of the Palestinian people, a treasure of immeasurable value, especially so due to the inter- minable length of the refugee ordeal, which has had an inevitably deep dis- ruptive impact on Palestinian identity. On the more fundamental matter of how to fit the overall Palestinian refugee question into an understanding of what the exercise of the right of self-determination and human rights implies, there is the need to rethink the relevance of refugees to a realpeace process. There is, first of all, the vital question of representation. Is the PLOcapable of representing the interests of the Palestinian refugee diaspora? There are worries about whether the PLOis sufficiently concerned about the rights of the refugees living within the Palestinian Territories, that is under the Palestinian National Authority. These concerns derive from the view that the PLOis primarily focused on achieving a Palestinian state, and seems willing to negotiate away most, if not all, of the rights of the Palestinian refugees under international law and morality. The international community has a particular responsibility, as well as an opportunity
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