Western policymakers
and media have misconstrued/misrepresented the Palestinian refugee
issue, ignoring its global context and core data. Moreover, the
Palestinian claim of dispossession -- which impacts the U.S. financial
aid to UNRWA, and is defined as a key issue in the peace process --
fails the reality test.
The global context
At the end of 2012, the
U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees documented 15.4 million refugees
worldwide -- excluding Palestinian refugees who are administered by the
United Nations Relief and Works Agency -- and 28.8 million internally
displaced persons. Four million of the refugees are from Afghanistan.
One of the results of the civil war in Sudan was 5.5 million refugees.
Fifteen million refugees (Hindu, Muslim and Sikh) were created by the
1947 partition of India, which created Pakistan. The Greco-Turkish war
of 1919-1922 involved a forced population exchange of two million
people.
From 1990 to 1991,
Saudi Arabia and Kuwait expelled 800,000 Yemenites and almost 300,000
Palestinians for collaborating with Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait.
Some 300,000 Palestinians -- who were allies of Saddam Hussein -- fled
Iraq following the first and second Gulf Wars. Since 1945, there have
been some 100 million refugees worldwide, most of them resettled. On the
other hand, Palestinian refugee camps in Arab territories have remained
intact since 1950, while Palestinian leadership conducts a lavish
life-style, including bank accounts stashed throughout the world.
Core data
According to an August
1971 Ford Foundation report, by 1950 the majority of the Palestinian
refugees began evacuating the camps and non-refugees moved in to benefit
from UNRWA's services. For example, half of the population in the
Jalazone refugee camp, near Ramallah, settled there after 1950.
A November 17, 2003
report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office documented that less
than 33% of registered Palestinian refugees live in refugee camps.
The actual number of
Palestinian refugees is determined by the following: Before the
1948-1949 War of Independence, 800,000 Arabs (per inflated numbers)
resided within the boundaries of "pre-1967 Israel." At the end of that
war, 170,000 Arabs stayed in Israel. Of the remaining 630,000 Arabs,
100,000 were absorbed by Israel's family reunification gesture; 100,000
middle and upper class Arabs left before the beginning of the 1948-1949
war and were absorbed by neighboring Arab states; 50,000 migrant
laborers returned to their Arab countries of origin; 50,000 Bedouins
joined their brethren-tribes in Jordan and Sinai; and 10,000 were war
fatalities. Thus, the actual total number of Palestinian refugees was
320,000. Most of the refugees followed their political, economic and
social leadership, which left before the eruption of the war. Many were
enticed to depart by Arab leaders, who promised a quick devastation of
the Jewish state that would provide the evacuees with Jewish property.
British authorities influenced others, pressuring the minority in mixed
Jewish-Arab towns to evacuate: Arabs evacuated but Jews did not.
The claim of dispossession examined
According to Dr. Yuval
Arnon-Ohanna of Ariel University and former head of the Mossad's
Palestinian research division ("Line of Furrow and Fire: The Conflict
for the Land of Israel, 1860-2010," 2013, pp. 397-415): "The birth of
the Palestinian refugee phenomenon -- in the form of a massive Arab
flight -- occurred during the Arab riots of 1936-39, not during the
1947-49 war. ... The flight was confirmed by the British consul general
to Beirut, G.W. Furlonge, in an October 27, 1938 report to the British
High Commissioner in Jerusalem ... and by the Lebanese daily, Al Akhbar,
in a December 1938 article. ... A documentation of 40,000 Arab
refugees, during 1936-39, was included in Dr. Rony Gabbay's 1959 Ph.D.
thesis, which was submitted to Geneva University. ...
"The flight was caused
by an Arab wave of terrorism, which was aimed initially at British
personnel and Jewish communities, but was rapidly diverted at Arab
targets. It perpetrated a violent anarchy among Arabs, totally devoid of
Jewish involvement. Just like the 1947-49 flight, the 1936-39 flight
triggered a departure by upper class Arabs, followed by lower and middle
class Arabs, who felt increasingly insecure. Many returned to their
countries of origin. ...
"The 1947-49 flight was
limited, mostly, to Arabs from the coastal plain and valleys of Israel,
while most mountain Arabs from the Galilee (which was taken over by
Israel, but produced very few refugees), Samaria and Judea remained
intact. ... Therefore, the Palestinian "claim of return" always
highlights the coastal plain [pre-1967 Israel]. ...
"The coastal plain was
devastated by the Muslims, following their victory over the Crusaders.
... Consequently, in the 19th century, Jaffa was reduced to a small
village, Haifa had less than 1,000 residents and the valleys (Jordan,
Beit Shean, Jezrael, Hula, etc.) were desolated, as documented by the
1881-83 surveys of the Palestine Exploration Fund. ...
"[Since 1882,] Jewish
[immigration] concentrated in the coastal plain, producing economic
growth, which attracted massive Arab immigration from neighboring
countries, mostly Egypt, Syria, Lebanon and North Africa. It was that
coastal population, and its descendants -- possessing limited roots in
the Land of Israel -- which fled in 1947, before the eruption of the
war. The flight was accelerated during the 1948-49 war."
Western policymakers and media
who ignore reality, and embrace the claim of Palestinian dispossession,
undermine the peace process and squander the Western taxpayers'
resources.
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