Right
To Return Of
Palestinian Refugees
By Salman Abu Sitta
Al-Ahram
Weekly
02 September, 2003
For the Palestinians, the right of return
to their pre-1948 homes is sacred. For the international community,
the right of return is enshrined in international law, as evidenced
by the sustained affirmation of this right by the UN 135 times so far.
For planners, the implementation of the right of return is quite feasible
according to serious and unchallenged studies in the last decade.
Who then undermines
the right of return? Israel, of course, and its supporters.
One of the basic
tenets of Zionism involves taking the land of Palestine and getting
rid of its people. This tenet was realised by all possible means: expulsion,
massacres, closures, house demolitions, starvation, harassment and other
means made possible by the great imbalance of power between the occupier
and the occupied. This is called "ethnic cleansing" in modern
parlance and in the language of the Statute of Rome of July 1998 which
gave birth to the International Criminal Court.
Ethnic cleansing,
that is expelling inhabitants from their homes, is a war crime. To prevent
these once slighted inhabitants from return, no matter what the reason
for their exodus, is also a war crime. That is why international law
is very clear and specific on this point. It is no accident that article
13 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, passed by the UN on
10 December 1948, stipulates that every person has the right to return
to his home. It is also no accident that on the following day, 11 December,
the UN passed the famous resolution 194, calling for the return of Palestinian
refugees to their homes.
This posed a serious
problem for Israel: fighting against this solid body of international
law. For Israel, there was an additional problem. Israel's admission
to the UN as a member state was conditional upon its compliance with
two UN resolutions: (1) accepting a full fledged Palestinian sovereign
state according to resolution 181 (Partition of Palestine), and (2)
accepting the return of the refugees to "their homes" according
to resolution 194.
The two conditions
are both applicable separately and there could be no substitution of
one for the other. Establishing a state is a sovereign act applicable
to a particular territory and its inhabitants. In general, the return
of refugees is an inalienable right held by any and all refugees that
entitles them to return at any time to their homes, whatever sovereignty
applies to the locality of these homes. The right of return can never
be diminished by passage of time or by any treaty, unless and until
each individual refugee agrees to willingly forfeit his right under
no duress. That is the crux of the matter. That is what made Israel
try so desperately since 1948 to penetrate this bedrock of international
law.
In the last five
decades, Israel and its supporters advanced over three dozen schemes
to resettle Palestinian refugees anywhere in the world except their
homes. Western emissaries came and went, threatening and bribing neighbouring
states through water schemes, joint projects, financial aid or through
the political rhetoric of branding them as extremist, terrorist-harbouring
states or calling them a threat to world peace.
All this failed.
So did five wars and innumerable Israeli raids. Millions of Arabs became
destitute; hundreds of thousands were wounded, imprisoned or saw their
lives shatter; tens of thousands lost their lives. Despite this hardship
none of the Palestinian refugees accepted the injustice of rights deprivation.
None forfeited their rights.
Then came Oslo,
with the false promise of peace. Peace to Israelis means "security".
Their kind of "security" means that the victims recognise
the legality of what was stolen and plundered, declare the acceptance
of occupation as legitimate and forgive all previous and current war
crimes. Peace to the Palestinians means restoration of their rights
usurped by brute force as well as insistence on application of international
law. It is no wonder that the promise of peace was soon found to be
a big disappointment.
Oslo has also produced
another growth: probably hundreds of non-governmental organisations
(NGOs) in the West Bank and Gaza financed by the West, particularly
by the European Union. Their aim is to facilitate Palestinian social
and economic development. The majority have performed good and imperative
services, especially during the particularly destructive periods of
the Israeli Occupation. But there are a minority who have another agenda.
The condition for their financial aid is that they do not address Palestinian
rights in what is today Israel; they can only deal with and advocate
a policy of "realism", i.e. accepting the status quo. By definition,
this contributed to efforts aimed at undermining international law by
casting doubts on its applicability and discouraging the Palestinians
from demanding its application.
The target of this
effort is the Palestinian individual, for it is only he who can forfeit
his right. Prestigious Western institutions financed seminars, workshops
and the like and invited selected Palestinian individuals who are on
the margin of political life. The idea was to create out of these individuals
an image of a "moderate" stance which stands in contrast with
those "extremists" who demand the application of international
law. Some institutions changed course when they realised that mainstream
opinion among the refugees opposes such an ideological terminology and
the suspension of rights guaranteed under international law.
The fact remains
that there are few Palestinians, probably less than a dozen, who are
given prominence in the Western media and audience in diplomatic circles
and who are generously funded. They conduct campaigns or surveys under
the name of peace and political realism, which, in the final analysis,
helps only Israel and its supporters. Absolutely none of them dare to
tell the Palestinian refugees publicly in Arabic what they whisper in
the ears of the Western diplomats in English or in Hebrew. The danger
posed by these misguided efforts is that they feed the West with false
information, almost in the same way the exiled Iraqi National Congress
misled Western governments. We know the embarrassment and scandals which
arose from that.
Take the case of
Sari Nusseibeh who was thrust in the limelight because he forged an
alliance with Ami Ayalon, the former director of the notorious Shin
Bet, the Israeli internal security organisation that has been responsible
for the torture and killing of Palestinian prisoners. Nusseibeh calls
for dropping the right of return in favour of a dubious formulation
of some entity to be called the "Palestinian State". The fallacy
of this argument is clear. It only serves to undermine international
law.
One wonders how
a man like Nusseibeh fails not to be repulsed by the thought that his
ally, Ayalon, invites him to "his" home which is in fact the
stolen home of a refugee from Ijzim near Haifa. He was equally not moved
when his host showed him a fig tree planted by the same now- refugee
owner of the stolen house. Nusseibeh is not moved either when he is
fêted at the Tel Aviv University Club in what was once the house
of the Mukhtar of Shaikh Muannis village.
Yet Nusseibeh diligently
holds campaigns and collects signatures to promote ideas which will
never move the Israelis to restore rights and will only harm the Palestinian
cause.
Then there is the
case of Khalil Shikaki. He rose from oblivion to the prominence of a
fancy office at Al-Najah University in Ramallah by churning out custom-made
surveys under imputed professional objectivity. He too is not moved
by the fact that his father and brother are still refugees in the foresaken
Rafah refugee camp, nor by the fact that the Israelis with whom he dines
were the determined killers of his own brother, Fathi.
His recent survey
caused an uproar among the refugees and a won wide acclaim in the West.
The survey claims
to serve the Taba negotiations which offer five options to the refugees:
one option entitles a tiny number to return to their homes under strict
conditions and many disincentives and the four other options lead to
the perpetuation of ethnic cleansing, i.e. getting rid of the refugees
by settling them anywhere other than their homes. Naturally, those options
are accompanied by clear or implied incentives.
Shikaki's findings
suggest that only ten per cent of Palestinian refugees wish to return
to their homes in what is now Israel and only one per cent wish to take
Israeli citizenship upon return to their homes. There are, however,
many critical problems with the survey, which posed a series of questions
that preclude objective results.
Take section Q4,
concerning those who want to recover their right to return home. The
respondent is asked if he wishes to take only Israeli citizenship. If
not, the options are to remain a refugee and accept compensation. Imagine
asking that of a refugee whose life has been shattered by the kind of
Israel that exists today. He was not asked to return to a democratic
state as stipulated in resolution 181. He was not asked if the racist
laws of Israel should be repealed. He was not asked if Israel's war
criminals were to be tried before he returned. Another provocative question
asks the respondent if he accepts national service in Israel, i.e. serving
in the Israeli army, a fantastic leap into surrealism. The question
ignores the fact that the Palestinians, who are now citizens of Israel,
do not, and are not required to, serve in the Israeli army. If the refugee
does not accept a hypothetical service in the Israeli military the only
option is that he is doomed to remain a refugee with or without compensation.
Then there is the
question, if you find your house destroyed or your land confiscated,
do you refuse to return and remain a refugee with or without compensation?
It is unbelievable to imagine that demolition or confiscation could
be an impediment to a Palestinian. The Palestinian population has increased
more than sixfold since 1948 and it is natural that it would have to
build many more houses, whether its old houses remained or not, as it
actually has done in Beirut, Amman and Kuwait. The composer of the survey
was probably unaware or uninterested in creating a survey question related
to the very real cases of Bosnia and Kosovo, when all confiscated land
was returned, or the case of Jewish property in Europe which was restored
by the World Jewish Restitution Organisation. The effect is to alienate
the respondant from considering that the exercise of his rights have
a precedent in international practice.
In general, the
survey suffered from two major defects. First, as it purposefully questions
an inalienable right it is an ill-intentioned survey. Second, the survey
is methodologically unsound and professionally unethical by leading
respondents to a pre-determined path. There are even doubts that the
survey was ever carried out at all in Lebanon and Jordan, at least in
a credible manner, since Palestinian refugees' NGOs never noticed its
execution. In an indignant response, 95 refugee societies and groups
in Lebanon denounced the survey in a published statement on 22 July.
In Jordan, the Committee for the Defence of the right of return, which
has representation for all political parties and in all refugee camps,
never heard of the survey and naturally denounced it. Shikaki responded
by saying that NGOs are not academically qualified to undertake such
survey. It is strange to say that about many NGOs that have produced
serious and highly respected studies for years. The real explanation
may lie in the fact that the selected sample is highly marginal and
was probably secretly paid to "sit" for the questionnaire
in secret.
The reaction to
the survey was predictable. To begin with refugees stormed Shikaki's
office and threw rotten eggs at him. Israeli and American headlines
screamed "Only 10 per cent of the refugees wish to return",
says an "eminent" pollster.
Richard Murphy of
the Council on Foreign Relations, an American think tank, along with
David Mack, jumped on the idea and suggested that, since so few would
return, the refugee issue could be resolved by inviting the international
community (not Israel) to "help fund the permanent settlement of
Palestinian refugees either in the new state of Palestine or in third
countries". In exchange, the US would pay to resettle in Israel
200,000 illegal Jewish settlers now in 1967- Occupied Palestine.
As Casey P Reilly
of the Palestine Centre in Washington noted, "Clearly the assault
on Shikaki and his office demonstrates that many refugees will go to
any length to defend their rights.... But the widespread ignorant and
de- contextualised manipulation of the data only shows that those Zionists,
whose prejudices have always militated against allowing Palestinians
to return home, are eager to make fools of themselves. They have convinced
each other that what they have wanted all along is really exactly what
the victims of their hatred and prejudice want too."
Shikaki himself
played differently to two audiences. He told Al-Jazeera on 19 July 2003
that over 90 per cent of the refugees insist on the right of return
and that his survey was designed to "serve" the Palestinian
negotiators. One wonders how? His survey in fact serves to undermine
their position if they demand the right of return.
Shikaki told his
audience in the US a different story. He told the National Public Radio
(NPR) and the Council on Foreign Relations that the right of return
is not a big issue in practical terms.
A self-hating Arab
like Fouad Ajami has ready access to the US public through the iron
curtain of the US media, notorious for its allergy to any criticism
of Israeli racist policies or to any clear and factual promotion of
the Palestinians' rights. It is no surprise therefore that US newspapers
and TV shows welcome Nusseibeh and Shikaki's articles and views. Here
are the good "moderate" Palestinians ready to shed their principles
and rights to accommodate Israel. Of course, no mention is made of the
rigid and intransigent Zionist doctrine which has never, over a century,
renounced its policy of ethnic cleansing against the Palestinians.
How else can one
explain that the Wall Street Journal, which has rarely said a good word
about the Palestinians, opened its pages to Shikaki. On 30 July 2003,
that influential daily published a piece by Shikaki on something he
does not believe in, "The right of return".
In the first paragraph
Shikaki comes out with the false conclusion that the two-state solution
has "logically advocated a division of the people with some becoming
Israeli and others Palestinian". What nonsense! The tenuous legal
foundation on which Israel based its declaration of "independence"
is the Partition Plan of 1947 (UN resolution 181). In chapters two and
three this resolution clearly stipulates the protection of the civil,
religious and political rights of the Palestinians in the new Israel
and the Jews in the new Palestine. Because the Jewish occupants of British
Mandatory Palestine were a minority, the new Israel had almost 50 per
cent of its population Palestinian, while the new Palestine had almost
no Jews. Neither the UN nor international law would ever tolerate, let
alone recommend, an ethno-religious racist state to be established under
its patronage.
Shikaki rails at
"the Arab countries that did little or nothing about the terrible
refugee suffering of more than 50 years", the very same Arab countries
he now expects to help Israel by settling the refugees permanently on
their land. Why would he expect these states to settle these refugees?
To preserve the "Jewish character" of Israel! He does not
tell us what is meant by this "Jewish character" of Israel.
If it is to maintain a Jewish majority forever, this is a pipe dream.
Apart from the fact that the Palestinians today make up about half the
population of historic Palestine, the Palestinian citizens of Israel
will be a majority in 40 years. Those who accept the traditional meaning
of the "Jewish character" are giving a licence to Israel to
commit another Nakba, or even genocide, against the Palestinians any
moment that Israel decides that the "Jewish character" is
threatened.
The international
community is against this notion of "Jewish character". It
severely criticised it repeatedly. In May 2003, the UN Committee on
Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, in paragraph 18 of its Concluding
Observations, censured this notion as discriminatory.
With such generous
funds allocated for surveys like Shikaki's, not one report has been
devoted to the absorptive capacity of Israel to receive the rightful
owners of the stolen homes and lands, as was done in Bosnia and Kosovo,
or to identify and repeal the racist laws of Israel. Indeed, I have
not seen any serious work by Nusseibeh or Shikaki to indicate any credible
knowledge of Palestine before 1948 or Israel. This type of work does
not generate lucrative income. Those NGOs in the West Bank and Gaza
who strayed into the forbidden territory of examining critical issues
regarding the right of return had their funds withdrawn.
The fat funds are
reserved for those prepared to disavow their rights, sell their land
and heritage for Judas's 30 pieces of silver and abandon their kith
and kin, those five million refugees afflicted with "this unhealthy
obsession with idealised rights", in Shikaki's words.
All such lucrative
and highly-discredited efforts aim to succeed where Israel has failed
in the last five decades. The aim is to bring the refugees to despair,
forfeit their rights and lay to waste their half-century of sacrifices
and determination. Meanwhile, Israel would end up with a huge chunk
of real estate free of charge, with owners giving it the seal of legitimacy.
The expelled inhabitants of 530 towns and villages will be doomed to
exile forever.
But this will never
happen. A succession of refugee conferences were held in the last two
months and will continue in the near future. The latest was a conference
held in mid-July in London in which 300 Palestinian participants came
from 14 European countries to affirm their right to return home. This
gathering refutes the assumption that the refugees only want shelter,
food and legal papers and willingly accept settlement elsewhere. The
right of return remains sacred, legal and possible. The refugees are
determined to make it happen, however long it takes.
* The writer is
president of the London-based Palestine Land Society.
Note: this article
was published on Al Ahram Weekly English online edition, Issue No. 651
14 - 20 August 2003.