Yes, they are refugees


March 23, 2018
Arthur Goodman

UNRWA aid packages in Gaza

Sara Roy, in London Review of Books, writes, “The recent decision by the Trump administration to drastically cut its contribution to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA)has left the Palestinian refugees in a more precarious position than ever. A conference was recently held in Rome to raise money to allow UNRWA to continue its vital work providing education, health and other social services to more than five million Palestinian refugees in Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, the West Bank and Gaza. Given a projected budget deficit of nearly $500 million in 2018, UNRWA’s funding prospects look dim.”

I have examined elsewhere the importance of UNRWA’s work and what might happen should its services be reduced or terminated. Here I would like briefly to address a criticism often levelled at UNRWA, that it somehow perpetuates the Palestinian refugee crisis by continuing to register as refugees descendants of the people who in 1948 were forced out of or fled what is now Israel.”

The issue of the Palestinian refugees has plagued Israel since its establishment and was a key obstacle during the Oslo negotiations more than twenty years ago. The refugees do represent a threat to Israel, though not the ‘irredentist dagger’ that Pipes claims. Rather, the refugees stand as a living and constant reminder of the historic injustice done to Palestinians when the Jewish state was founded. Denying refugee status to future generations of Palestinians is simply a way to erase the refugee issue and, with it, the rights to which refugees are legally and morally entitled.” (read more)

© Copyright JFJFP 2024