The Palestinian Refugees Problem The Israeli Dimension Of The Issue of the Palestinian Refugees and Displaced Persons

The Palestinian Refugees Problem 

The Israeli Dimension Of The Issue of the Palestinian Refugees and Displaced Persons  

Dr. Farouq Sitan Al-Shannaq  

Publication of

the Royal Committee for Jerusalem Affairs 

1st Edition

Amman 2005

 Introduction: 

No issue has been more affected by the “New World Order” than the Palestinian Question. The effect of the New World Order has been such that it has influenced this problem in all its various dimensions. For the United States of America’s (USA’s) monopolization of the international decision and its absolute hegemony over the international legal institutions have enabled the U.S.A. and Israel, its strategically, to impose their view on the Arab/Israeli conflict. This perspective encompassed the format of settling this conflict in terms of the method, mechanism, levels and time framework. The following are the major foundations on which the US/Israeli perspective of the Arab/Israeli conflict are based:

  1. Dissociation of the Palestinian Question of its international dimension and particularly of its frame of reference. In this respect, it should be noted that the U.S.A. has appointed itself a guardian of international legitimacy resolutions. On the surface, it made abiding by and unconditional compliance with these resolutions a token and title of its foreign policy. This policy, however, has become universally known as the “double standard” or “selective” policy because it is only applied to those whom Washington labels as enemies or international outlaws within whom Israel is, most certainly, not included.
  2. Splitting the Arab/Israeli conflict and converting it from a multilateral Arab/Israeli civilizational, existential and national conflict into a bilateral  Israeli/Syrian, Israeli/Lebanese, Israeli/Palestinian and Israeli/Jordanian, and so on conflict. This, of course, dictates a search for separate individual solutions within a bilateral and not a Pan –         Arab/ Israeli framework.
  1. Divesting the Palestinian Question of its nationalist Pan/Arab dimension and turning it from a national cause into a single country question that concerns the Palestinians alone. Thus, the Pan – Arab character of this cause is made to disappear once and for all.
  1. Fragmentation of the Palestine Question in terms of its national dimension and its conversion from a question of national liberation into scattered conflicting issues with some of which are classified as urgent while others are categorized as deferrable. Thereby, the Palestine Question has been transformed into diverse issues that are to be separately negotiated. The following are the most significant issues :
  • Palestinian Refugees
  • State and Sovereignty
  • Security, Borders and Settlements
  • Water
  • Jerusalem
  1. Drowning the Arabs, in general, and the Palestinians, in particular, into the vortex of classifications and defining negotiation priorities. In other words, the Arabs, and especially the Palestinians,  were dragged into dancing to the tune of the US/Israeli alliance exactly like what had happened in the aftermath of the June 1967 aggressive Israeli war. For the Arab arena was then flooded with a series of US/Israeli projects, which did not aim at searching for a solution for the Arab/Israeli conflict but instead caused more splits, divisions and disagreements within the Arab ranks. The aim was to give Israel more time to perpetuate and consolidate its occupation of the Arab territories and to Judaize them, which Israel wants to keep for itself forever, especially Jerusalem. One striking illustrative example was the rift caused in the Arab world by the Rogers Plan after its acceptance by President Abd al-Nasser in 1969, when the Arabs were divided into supporters and opponents of this plan. This, it should be noted, provides a living example of the danger of such imperialist schemes.

Thus, the “New World Order” has succeeded in fragmenting the Palestinian cause in the context of its national, Pan-Arab and international dimensions. This paved the road for negotiating under Arab, regional and international circumstances where the balance tilted in favor of Zionist Israel. This state of affairs suited an   US/Israeli negotiating framework under American supervision, patronage and sponsorship. One of the issues to be negotiated within a bilateral, i.e.   Palestinian/Israeli, and within a multilateral framework was the Palestinian refugees issue, which is viewed by some Arab quarters as the most important dimension of the Palestinian Question. For the problem of the Palestinian refugees and their right to return or compensation is the other side of the Palestinian cause. It presents the cause of a people who have been forcibly uprooted from their native land and turned into homeless refugees scattered all over the world. Another people has been made to replace the Palestinians in accordance with the Zionist Jewish and Anglo-Saxon colonialist and imperialist plans.

Anyway, regardless of the status and ranking of the issue of the Palestinian refugees in the order of the Palestinian negotiator’s priorities, it can be said that the future of the Palestine Question and of the Arab-Israeli conflict is dependent on how this question is settled. Hence, the importance of this symposium, which is held by the Yarmouk University Center for the Refugee and the Displaced Persons Studies about the “Future of the Palestinian Refugees.” In this context, the researcher saw fit that the title of this paper combines the title of the symposium with the topic of his paper because he feels that the problem of the Palestinian refugees is a Zionist Jewish and an Anglo-Saxon imperialist manufacture under an international cover where, it must be admitted, the Arab side bears some responsibility therein. Arab responsibility here lies in the fact that the Arab side has not been up to the task and lacked seriousness in facing the imperialist Zionist danger that threatened the Arab homeland in the early years of the 20th century.

And since the Israeli vision of the refugees and displaced persons is the predominant one in dealing with these two issues, the researcher decided that the theme of this paper should be “The Israeli Dimension of the Palestinian Refugees and Displaced Persons”.

It is to be noted, however, that this does not underestimate the importance of the other dimensions, particularly the international one as the underlying and legally facilitating factor in these two issues.

In this paper, the researcher will attempt to answer a set of questions listed hereunder:

  • What are the principles and foundations that govern the Israeli perspective with regard to the Palestinian refugees and displaced persons issue?
  • What are the draft solutions plans that Israel proposes for the Palestinian refugees and displaced persons?
  • How far do the Israeli draft solutions correspond with the resolutions of international legitimacy, and is it possible that the Arab, and particularly the Palestinian side will accept them?
  • How much do the Israeli vision and draft projects agree with the American perspective and positions towards the refugees and displaced persons issues, especially when the U.S.A. is the effective sponsor of the Palestinian/Israeli negotiations at their bilateral as well as multilateral levels?
  • Finally, how do Israelis envisage the future of the Palestinian refugees and displaced persons issues?

Principles And Foundations

Governing The Israeli Perspective

The Israeli perspective of the Palestinian refugee problem with regard to its origin, continuity and solution is governed by a number of Zionist Jewish principles where the religious is intertwined with the political. The following is a summary of these principles:

First:

The conglomeration of the Zionist Jewish Talmudic Torah myths inspired by the distorted Mishnah. The most significant of these myths is the “divine selection of the Jews” as the “chosen people of God”, the “Promised Land”, a “land without people for a people without land” and the “ethnic cleansing theory.”(1) The medley of the Zionist Jewish myths is a set of constants that constitute the cornerstones of Zionist Jewish policy towards Palestine in terms of land, people and framework of the reference of the Zionist entity’s Palestinian policy. The most significant of these cornerstones are:

  • The dignity of the Jews is inextricably linked to their return to Palestine. For the settlement of the Jews outside Palestine will remain a cause of Jewish weakness. Meanwhile, their power, dignity and greatness are linked to their return to Palestine.
  • Assimilation of Jews within their indigenous societies is a Jewish taboo. The same applies to the national feeling of the Jews and their sense of belonging to the states whose nationalities they carry. For their national feeling and sense of affiliation is restricted to the idea of the anticipated “Jewish State” in Palestine and confined to the Zionist entity. The American Jew, for example, even though he carries the American nationality, should not at all develop a sense of American citizenship or of belonging to the American state because national feeling and affiliation cannot belong except to Israel alone ; citizenship is one thing and a feeling of nationality and belonging is quite another.
  • “Rebuilding of the Jewish State” in Palestine is a national religious duty where what is religious and spiritual goes hand in hand with what is national. Thus, the idea of the return to Palestine, as Dr. Edward Sidhum rightly believes, is not merely a spiritual idea that aims only at worship and revival of spiritual traditions. In fact, it has been mixed with a political idea whose purpose is to establish a Zionist Jewish state like all other states in the world.(2) Since the beginning of the 19th century, “both the spiritual and political concept have become like two sides of one coin, neither of which can be separated from the other.”(3)
  • Adoption of introversion and seclusion as a way of Jewish life, as both constitute the basis of the system that realizes for Zionist Judaism two inextricably linked objectives. The first objective is of a preliminary constructive nature while the second is of a tangible material nature. These two objectives aim at non-assimilation of Jews in their indigenous societies and at their unification towards the idea of rebuilding the Jewish state in Palestine through migration to that country and the establishment of the Jewish entity. Moreover, the “ghetto system” provides the Jews with the concept of external or goyim enemy that, according to the Zionist Jewish perspective, represents everything which is non – Jewish. The importance of the external enemy notion lies in its rallying the Jews around the Jewish state idea to save themselves from extinction because of the enmity harbored by the goyim against them.
  • Legitimization of the maxim that the “end justifies the means” as a divine conduct (inspired by that of the prophets of the Children of Israel) including rape and extermination. Such Zionist Jewish allegations, it should be noted, remain assumed conclusions forcibly inspired by the prophets’ behavior. The aim here is to bestow legitimacy on the Zionist entity and to legalize its political behavior towards others.

 

Secondly:

Israel is not responsible in any way for the Palestinian refugees problem. According to this viewpoint, the responsibility totally lies on the Arab side, which asked the Palestinians to temporarily leave their country in order to enable the Arabs to recover by force of arms the “part allocated to Israel (according to the 1947 Partition Plan.)” This was to be accomplished by the war which their armies waged against the newborn Jewish entity, so the Israeli point of view goes. According to this Israeli perspective, the Palestinians are also partly held responsible because they believed their fellow Arabs who incited them to leave the country.

But how true is this Israeli account? To what extent can it stand in the face of historical facts and the       Arab/Israeli conflict literature throughout its various stages and vis-a-vis the statements and declarations of the Zionist entity founders?

In recalling the statements made by the thinkers of Zionist Judaism and the founders of its Israeli substitutive colonialist entity, one thing becomes unquestionably clear. Zionist Judaism is totally responsible for the rise of the Palestinian refugees problem. It was this Zionism that did lay the foundations of this problem. In this context, Smilanski, one of the founders of the “Jewish National Home”, says:

“Palestine must be the home country of the Jewish people and it is possible to transfer the Arabs of Palestine to the neighboring Arab countries.”(4)

Alfred Mond, another leader of Zionist Judaism, says, “The day on which the Temple will be rebuilt has become near, and I will dedicate the remaining days of my life to build a great temple on the site of the Aqsa Mosque”(5). Dr Edward Sidhum quotes one of the Zionist Jewish leaders  as having said: “The Muslims have nothing to do but to move to a land other than this.”(6)

The emphasis laid by the Zionist Jewish leaders on Jewish immigration to Palestine was one of the main causes that led to the emergence of the Palestine refugee problem before the rise of the Zionist entity. This was done through eviction of the Arabs by immigrants and then replacing them. In the year 1914 the number of the Jews in Palestine did not exceed ninety thousand while in 1946 they rose up to more than half a million. The Jewish immigrants were young people who had received good military training in European camps before migrating to Palestine. They also included scientists, intellectuals and people with substantial material potentials.

It was from within the ranks of those immigrants that the most dangerous Zionist Jewish gangs arose: the Hagana and Stern, which played a major part in accelerating the rise of the refugee problem because of the massacres they perpetrated against the Arabs in Deir Yasin village and elsewhere. This naturally horrified the Arab inhabitants and caused the flight of over two hundred and fifty thousand Arabs to the neighboring Arab countries(7) before the declaration of the foundation of the Zionist state on May 15, 1948.

These facts cannot be denied even by Israelis themselves, for Benny Morris, in his explanation of the Palestinian exodus phenomenon, says:

“The flight of the Arabs from their villages used to take place only after (and not before) the Jewish attack against those villages.”(8)

Thirdly:

Israeli refusal to abide by the relevant international legitimacy resolutions, the most important of which was the UN General Assembly Resolution No. 194 for the Year 1948, which is internationally known as the right of return and compensation or reparations which the United Nations Organization has made a condition for the admission of Israel to its membership. Israel merely displayed a tactical compliance with this condition but soon turned its back thereto after it had achieved its goal of admission to the U.N. Thus, Israel has insisted on refusing, in principle, to allow the Palestinian refugees to return or accept to pay them any reparations. For from a Zionist Jewish perspective this would undermine the foundations of the Jewish State and damage the fabric of the Zionist Jewish society. In his justification of Israel’s rejection of the idea of the return of Palestinian refugees, Shlomo Gazet says:

“The Israeli government also refuses (refugee return) particularly on a practical basis, for there is actually no possibility for returning the refugees to their homes and lands without tearing down the fabric of people and society in the entire Israel. Moreover, a large proportion of Israeli settlements is built on lands that were formerly inhabited by Palestinian Arabs, and there is no way to restore these lands and other possessions to those who were staying therein 47 years ago without uprooting hundreds of thousands of Israelis from their present places of residence. This would certainly cause a ruinous convulsion to Israeli society. Their (Palestinian refugees) return to Israeli territory without returning them to their original lands would mean (in this case) a devastating rise in the number of the Palestinian Arabs, which would gravely endanger the Jewish character of Israel.”(9)

Fourthly:

Abrogation of anything that reminds of the refugee issue including all international organizations, foremost of which is the UNRWA (United Nations Relief and Works Agency).

The Israeli Policy Towards

the Palestinian Refugee Issue

The Zionist Jewish/Israeli vision (with its various dimensions) of the Palestinian refugee issue, cannot be complete without knowing its practical side, i.e. the policy applied by Israel. Furthermore, Israel’s practical policy as regards this issue would be impossible to comprehend in isolation from Israel’s policy in the fields of immigration and settlement. For immigration and settlement constitute two basic props of the establishment of Israel, on the one hand, and its survival and continuity to exist, on the other hand. This is what explains the pivotal position of these two factors in the Zionist Jewish strategy and the crucial role they play in drawing and delineating the features of Israel’s policy throughout the various phases of its genesis and evolution. It also explains the policies laid down by its successive governments, be they Labor or Likud. This is a principal fact that is beyond any doubt whatsoever. So, “the mainstays of the Zionist project are based on two pillars: settlement and Jewish immigration. Settlement would not be carried out without seizure of land and eviction of the Palestinian inhabitants to be replaced by Jewish immigrants.”(10)

The Zionist Jewish project with its theme of “rebuilding the Jewish State” in Palestine is firmly linked with the Zionist Jewish policy of deportation and replacement as the effective mechanism in the accomplishment of this substitutive, colonialist, evacuative and imperialist project. In addition, the Zionist Jewish “deportation and substitution” policy has passed, in accordance with the rise and evolution of the Zionist entity, through various phases, which the researcher will adopt in dealing with the Israeli policy towards the Palestinian refugees issue. The aim is not to dismantle the Zionist project and the Jewish Zionist “deportation substitution” policy but to highlight the distinctive features of each phase in the implementation of the Zionist project. These phases may be summarized as follows:

 

First:

Theorization, Intellectual and Propagandist Preparation Stage:

The theorizers and pioneers of the Zionist Judaism in this phase concentrated on the following principles and goals:

  • Deportation of the Palestinian Arabs from the “Land of Israel” to Iraq and the readiness to finance deportation processes to an extent that enables the Palestinian Arabs to become integrated into the Iraqi society, especially in the agricultural field.
  • Inadmissibility of transferring the Palestinian Arabs to Syria and Transjordan because the latter two belong geographically to the “Land of Israel” to which the Jewish State was bound to extend at later stages in an embodiment of the Zionist Judaism motto “from the Euphrates to the Nile.”

   Although Arab official circles continued to view this at the time as a mere slogan, the development of the Zionist entity points to quite a different direction, especially as the political and religious upbringing of the Israeli rising generations pivots around this motto as a future aim. This is evident from a reply made by Shimeon Peres, the former Israeli Prime Minister and Foreign Minister, who is viewed by many Arab official quarters and some educated circles as a “peace dove.” Peres’s reply was made to a question recently addressed to him by Elie Kamir, a reporter working with the Israeli newspaper “Ma’ariv”,  about whether he (Peres) really believed in what the Palestinian President Yasir Arafat wants. Peres said in reply: “Arafat says that he wants 22% of the Western Land of Israel (Palestine) and not even the UN map.”(11)

But what does this practically mean?

    Practically, it means that there is the “Eastern Eretz Israel”, i.e. the land of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. This is  even  so though Israel is linked to the latter by a peace treaty, which is recognized by both parties who signed it, and which is deposited with the United Nations Organization as one of its  documents. Some will say that this is mere humbug that belongs to the realm of public relations and does not go to reach the dream of the “Jewish State” with its Biblical boundaries. But recent events in Palestine point to otherwise than this political oversimplification of things.

  • The policy of forcible seizure of land and uprooting the people from their land as well as the genocide policy are absolutely indispensable for the establishment of the “Jewish State”.
  • Expulsion of the Palestinians is a necessity for the realization of the goal of converting Palestine from an “arid desert” into a “green paradise”.
  • Resettlement of displaced Arabs in the neighboring Arab countries.
  • Settlement in the Zionist Jewish understanding means replacing Palestinian Arabs with Jews and settlement of Palestinians in Arab countries.
  • Getting rid of Turkish rule and repartitioning the countries governed by the Ottoman Empire before liberation. They are to be partitioned according to population majorities so that Palestine, whose Jewish population at that time accounted for no more than 10% of the total indigenous inhabitants, would be allocated exclusively for the Jews. In this process, the principle of population exchange would be adopted, i.e. the Jews in Arab countries would be exchanged with Palestinian Arabs.
  • Special emphasis on seizing land through one of the three following means:

– Use of military force

– Land confiscation

– Land purchase(12)

  • Concentration on the deportation policy in both ways: the compulsory procedure that should be adopted with regard to the transfer of the Palestinian Arabs to the Arab countries and the propagandist intimidation procedure with regard to attracting the Jews of the world to Palestine. In an article written in the year 1930 by Abraham Sharon, the Zionist writer, under a significant and meaningful heading of “Arab Imperialism” we read:

     “It is possible to settle the dispute in the country only on the basis of transferring most or a large part of the (Arab) people to another country in accordance with a double evacuation agreement consisting of two parts: an immigration agreement to ensure the regular absorption of the Jews in the country (Palestine) and an emigration agreement for the Arabs to secure gradual liquidation of getting out the belongings and movable property in a specific manner based on a funding plan agreed upon between international agencies and governments.”(13)

  • It is impossible to arrive at a voluntary agreement between the Zionists and the Palestinian Arabs. Therefore, sheer force must be resorted to in order to create demographic changes in favor of the Zionist scheme in a preparatory step towards the establishment of the Jewish State and protecting it by force of arms and by means of the “iron wall”, according to Vladimir Jabotinsky.”(14)
  •           Working for deportation of the Arabs from the future Jewish State through an agreement with the Arab countries. For the main concern which preoccupied David Ben Gurion, the first prime minister of a Zionist Jewish government, was the transfer to the neighboring Arab states of the Arabs from the territory proposed for the Jewish State in the 1937 Peel Commission’s Recommendation. This recommendation provided the background for the Partition Resolution No. 181 of the year 1947. In this context Ben Gurion wrote:

     “The principle of forced transfer of the Arabs from the areas proposed (for the Jewish State) may give us something which never belonged to us even when we were masters of our own affairs, neither during the First Temple nor in the Second Temple periods… Now we have a possibility which we have never dreamt of and we have not dared even to dream of.”(15)

     The future plan relating to the Jewish State and the gathering of the Jews from all over the world to Palestine was included in the letter written by Ben Gurion to his son Amos on October 5, 1937, which reads as follows:

     “When we get one thousand or ten thousand dunums, we will be happy because acquisition of land is important not only in itself but also because through it we can strengthen ourselves. Any augmentation of our own power will help us to take possession of the entire country. We will bring to this state all the Jews whom we can absorb… The relatively sparse population of the country provides us with great potentials for settlement. This means that these lands are not needed by the Arabs who cannot exploit them… Moreover, we will be stronger in any confrontation with the Arabs. The more the Jewish power rises in the country, the more the Arabs will realize that it will be impossible for them to confront us because it would be in vain.”(16)

     What really calls for amazement and disapproval, however, is Ben Gurion’s claim that the transfer of the Palestinian Arabs to Iraq and Syria would constitute a common interest for Iraq, Syria and Israel. For, in his opinion, the settlement of the Palestinian Arabs in Iraq and Syria would enhance the potentials of both countries in any encounter with their enemies the Persians and the Turks, on the one hand, and provide the Jews with the opportunity for the establishment of the Jewish State and guarantee its continuity, on the other hand.(17)

  • Impossibility of having Jews and Arabs on one and the same land. In this context Yosef Wise one of the most prominent Zionist Jewish leaders had the following comment to say about the Peel British Royal Commission:

     “The eviction does not only aim at the reduction of the number of Palestinians, but also aspires to evacuating the cultivable land of Arabs (and its liberation) and consequently to Jewish settlement.”(18)

     Wise also finds it necessary to initially concentrate on making the Palestinian peasants leave their cultivable land and then evacuating the urban areas of their indigenous inhabitants. He opines that it is necessary to resort to persuading the Palestinian Arabs to evacuate their lands and voluntarily move towards Arab states. He stresses that it is imperative to evacuate the whole of Palestine of its indigenous inhabitants. For this was the only way of salvation for the Jews, as he says in this regard:

     “Salvation will come only through emptying the country (Palestine) of its Arab inhabitants to keep it totally for us. There is no room here for us and our neighbors. Meanwhile, development is an extremely slow process, for there are very large numbers of Arabs and they are deeply rooted in this country. The only way is for us is to get them out and eradicate them… We have to find listening ears in America and then in Britain and then in the neighboring countries, whereupon the problem will find its solution.”(19)

     In light of the above survey of the theoretical  promotion of the idea of the Jewish State, we can conclude the following :

  •           The unanimity among the Zionist Judaism’s earlier and later thinkers and   pioneers as well as those of the substitutive, settlement, colonist movement that the “deportation and substitution” policy is the only way open for the realization of the Zionist Jewish scheme.

Here their differences disappear, except when it comes to the land where the Palestinians may be transferred to. Some of these Zionist thinkers and pioneers believe that it is Iraq alone. Others feel that they can be transferred to neighboring Arab countries. Moreover, some differences crop up in the terminology used in drafting the Zionist Jewish schemes and views about the Zionist Jewish “policy of deportation and substitution.” For the vast majority of the pioneers of Zionist Judaism think that force, violence and subjugation is the only means to be used, while  a minority is inclined towards moderation as a preferred approach and only for tactical and not substantive goals.

It is impossible for the “Jewish State”  to see light and for the land to be evacuated of its native inhabitants without collusion with the imperialist and international big powers, i.e. Britain and U.S.A.

  •           Luring the Arab states into the trap of the Zionist Jewish scheme through utilization of Jewish funds to bribe Arabs therewith.
  • There is no objection to the adoption of a piecemeal approach in the realization of the Zionist plan for reasons related to Jewish subjective circumstances, on the one hand, and the Arab regional and international conditions, on the other hand.

 

Secondly:

The Substitutive Colonialist Projects Stage:

This stage comprises three periods:

The Period of Partial Occupation of Palestine

This period spans the years 1948 to 1967, i.e. from the proclamation of the birth of Zionist state that was accompanied with the expulsion of the vast majority of the Palestinian Arabs living in the territories that lie under Israeli control until the breakout of the June 5, 1967 War. The Zionist Jewish deportation and substitution policy of this period is characterized by the emergence of two trends that were united in goals but relatively different in practice and methodology. The first was the trend of immediate and wholesale deportation and substitution. The most prominent protagonist of this trend was Yatzhak Ben Zvi, the second president of Israel, and Yosef Wise of the Jewish National Fund.

The second was the trend of security option which called for dealing with the Arab minority within the foreseeable future with special emphasis on security consideration and not on deportation and substitution considerations.

Therefore, Israeli policy at this stage was something like a rotative combination between basic tenets and props of the deportation and substitution policy, on the one side, and the requirements of phased tactics on the other.

That policy bore fruit in a number of schemes for the deportation of Palestinians and settling them in some Arab countries, but the leaders of the Zionist movement were not lucky enough to put such schemes into practice except in Libya. It only succeeded in transporting a few hundred (1948 Arabs) to Libya through bribery of some tribal chieftains.

Israel’s failure to deport the 1948 Arabs is attributed by specialists in the Palestinian refugees issue and deportation policy to two principal factors:

  1. The firm stand displayed by the 1948 Arabs of holding on to their land and their adamancy on frustrating the Israeli deportation and substitution policy.
  2. The theoretical termination of the problem through the remaining Palestinian Arabs’ acquisition of Israeli nationality within the framework of the Israeli state, which would cause embarrassment to the Zionist entity if it continued to drive out the Arabs of Palestine and went ahead with the policy of deportation and substitution.(20)

The most distinctive quality of this stage, however, was Israeli insistance, as before and afterwards,  on non-compliance with Resolution 194 of the year 1948, which provided for the right of Palestinian refugees to return home at the earliest possible time and their right to compensation and reparation if they chose not to return. Another distinctive quality was Israel’s absolute objection to the return of any Palestinian refugee to whom this resolution applied.

The causes and arguments presented by Israel in its obstruction of the Return Resolution constitute an unqualified condemnation for it, although these aim just at the opposite. In this context, Shlomo Gazet says in his attempt to explain Israel’s failure to frustrate the resolution, which it rejects in principle as well as in practice.

He states : “Israel repudiates this right primarily as a matter of principle. For it entails Israel’s recognition of the right of return and implies its admission of its responsibility for the rise of the refugee problem and its accountability for the consequences of this problem. Israel does not hold itself responsible at all for the 1948 War. On the contrary, it holds the Palestinian Arab side entirely responsible. For this reason many Israelis oppose the proposal which calls on Israel to absorb a limited number of Palestinian refugees in accordance with the criteria of family reunion…. The Israeli government also refuses the return on a practical basis. It is practically impossible for refugees to return to their homes and lands without undermining the fabric of the people and society in the whole of Israel… A large number of the settlements in Israel were built on lands which were formerly inhabited by Palestinian Arabs. There is no way for the restoration of these lands and property to those who were residing in them forty- seven years ago without uprooting hundreds of thousands of Israelis from their places. This would certainly cause a destructive convulsion in the Israeli society”(21)….. “Their (Palestinian refugees) return to their lands would inevitably lead to a devastating rise in the number of Palestinian Arabs, which would gravely endanger the Jewish character of Israel.”(22)

The Period of the Total Occupation of Palestine

This period is practically concerned with the Israeli deportation and substitution policy after the war which broke out on June 5, 1967. It was an aggressive expansionist war launched by Israel against the neighboring Arab countries, which resulted in making the area of the newly occupied territories by Israel five times larger than the area before the eruption of that war. For Israel completed the occupation of the whole of Palestine in addition to the Syrian Golan Heights and the Egyptian Sinai Peninsula. Thereby, it added new millions of Palestinian Arabs to those who have been known by the media literature as the “1948 Arabs”. This new occupation, it should be noted, has placed Israel face to face with a multi-faceted and risky demographic dilemma in the form of a demographic time bomb that may explode at any moment. This dictated an immediate solution to enable Israel to avoid threatening potential risks resulting from its occupation of the Arab territories. It was not surprising that the main effort of the national coalition at that time was focused on the immediate consideration of ways and means leading to the liquidation of the refugees issue in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.(23)

The most significant aspect of the Israeli deportation and substitution policy at that time was inundating the region with a flood of Israeli projects not least important of which were the Alon Plan, the Dayan Plan, the Ranan Wise Plan and the Don Zakin Plan. All of these projects have one thing in common : they all aimed at putting an end in one way or another to the Palestinian refugees problem and to completely eradicate the Resolution of return and reparations No 194 of Year 1948.(24)

The Period of Unilateral Solutions

The unilateral solutions period dates back to the year 1979. For on March 26, 1979 the first separate peace treaty was signed between Egypt and Israel. By that treaty Egypt recovered the Sinai Peninsula in return for the latter’s disarmament and removing Egypt, the biggest and strongest Arab state in terms of conventional and dynamic power, from the arena of the Arab/Israeli conflict. Thereby, the door was flung wide open for drowning the region in bloodshed, which the Egyptian president himself threatened to do in his reaction to the resolutions of the Baghdad Summit Conference of 1978. This was evidenced by the fact that the region witnessed two devastating wars within over one decade. The first was regional: the Iranian/Iraqi War, which lasted for eight years and ended with Iraqi victory. The second was regional/global war planned for and led by the U.S.A. It was the war that ended with removing Iraq, the second largest Arab military power, from the Arab/Israeli confrontation arena, though temporarily. The stage was set for American Israeli dictates. The Palestine Question, which constituted the core of the Arab/Israeli conflict was not only deprived of its international and Pan – Arab dimensions but was also fragmented in terms of its national dimension. It was also reduced from one single central cause to scattered issues. This provided a supplementary mechanism to reinforce the role of the Israeli negotiator in the direct negotiations as approved by the Madrid Conference in its bilateral and multilateral aspects. Thus, it gave precedence to the                   Israeli/U.S. perspective of peace. Among these issues was the Palestinian refugee problem, which was deferred to the final status negotiations by virtue of the Oslo Accords of Gaza – Jericho First which was arrived at through direct secret negotiations between the Palestinian and Israeli parties. The signing of the official formal copy which came to be known as the ” Palestinian/Israeli Declaration of Principles (D.O.P.)” was done in Washington under the patronage of the former U.S. President Bill Clinton on September 13, 1993. The signatory parties were the Palestinian President Yasir Arafat and the former Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin.

Thus, the Palestinian/Israeli Declaration of Principles Agreement divested the Palestinian refugee cause of its international frame of reference, i.e. Resolution 194 for the year 1948. Thereby, its legal cover had been stripped off.

The displaced persons topic, on the other hand, lay within  the jurisdiction of the Quartet Committee pursuant to the UN Security Council’s Resolution       No. 237 for the year 1967, which provided for the unconditional return of the displaced persons. This resolution, it should be noted, has left it for the Quartet to decide the displaced persons’ return on an individual basis and by consensus, which gave Israel the right of veto as regards the procedures of admitting the persons who left the West Bank and Gaza Strip but did not give them the right to return. The agreement also invested a security and social dimension on Oslo Accord when it conditioned the approval of admitting displaced persons to taking necessary measures for prevention of security violation and spread of disorder.”(25) In other words, the agreement does not provide for “return” but for “acceptance” or admission” of displaced persons on condition that it is left to Israel to decide the method of implementation, subject to its security requirements. This explains the ineffectiveness of this Quartet, which has been flooded by Israel with boring definitions and details that disrupted the work of this committee. Israel, by that means, deferred everything which it found should be included within the framework of the Palestinian refugees to the final status negotiations in accordance with the Oslo Accords and the Palestinian/  Israeli Declaration of Principles.

To put it in a nutshell, the Israeli perspective of the issues of the Palestinian refugees and displaced persons during the post – Madrid period can be summarized as follows:

  • Israel’s adherence to its stand which refuses in principle any recognition of the Palestinian refugee problem and of its responsibility therefore. In addition, it firmly opposed the return of any refugee to Palestine except for some humanitarian cases within the framework of “family reunion”.
  • Israeli insistence on the differentiation between the terms “refugees” and “displaced persons”. Moreover, Israel refuses to comply with the resolution of the international legitimacy concerning the right of the Palestinian refugees to return and to compensate those who do not wish to return in accordance with Resolution No 194 for the year 1948. This being so despite the fact this was a condition for its admission to U.N. membership. This Israeli refusal is made under the pretext that the resolution is not binding because it was taken by the U.N. General Assembly. Consequently, Israel feels that it is a mere recommendation with the implementation being left to the discretion of the concerned party. What is surprising is that this viewpoint finds circulation among Arab researchers and specialists who do not realize the gravity of their theses which are often exploited by Israel in justifying its refusal to abide by the Resolution and in shirking its responsibilities in accordance with international legitimacy.

     The displaced persons, on the other hand, are those who left the West Bank and Gaza Strip in the aftermath of June 1967 War Yet, Israel does not recognize more than about two hundred thousand people who can be labeled as displaced persons, while the Arab side estimates the number of displaced persons to be at nine hundred thousand.

     It should be noted in this context that Israel insists on its refusal to recognize anything except the nuclear family, i.e. the married couple and their children only. Thereby, it contradicts the various definitions of the refugee and displaced person. Most important of these definitions is the definition of the 1951 charter, which makes the term “refugee” apply to any person “residing outside his home country owing to a justified fear of being subjected to persecution because of race, religion, nationality, membership of a certain group or holding a political opinion, and who is unable or unwilling because of this fear to benefit from this country’s protection for him, or he does not have the nationality. Owing to the fact that being outside the country of his official residence is not able, or out of fear, he is not willing to go back to his home country.”(26) This definition does not apply to the refugees registered with the UNRWA.

     UNRWA, on the other hand, defines the Palestinian refugee as “any person whose normal residence was in Palestine for a period of not less than two years before the conflict of the year 1948 and who because of this conflict had lost his home and source of livelihood.” Offspring according to UNRWA’s definition means “the offspring (children and grandchildren) of a Palestinian refugee (parents) born after May 14, 1948 A.D.”(27)

On the whole, it can be said that the Quartet which held its first meeting in Ottawa, Canada at the beginning of March 1995, and held other subsequent meetings, came to a standstill because of the negotiating policy of Israel, which is designed to obstruct and eventually foil the work of the Quartet Committee. Israel in this position exploited the Oslo Accords and the Palestinian/Israeli Declaration of Principles and the Wadi Arabah Agreement, which came “to strengthen the foundations laid by the   Israeli/Palestinian Agreement. Thus, it regarded the refugee and displaced persons issues to be major humanitarian problems caused by the Middle East conflict to both sides. It also ignored the delineation of the Palestinian identity of these refugees. Moreover, it divested the refugees and displaced persons issue of the term of reference of international legitimacy resolutions, which proposes settling as a basis of the solution of the refugees problem.”(28) In other words, the agreement adopted the Israeli argument and thereby served the Israeli vision of the Palestinian refugees issue.

  • Israel insisted on the necessity of solving the problem of the Palestinian refugees through their settlement in the Arab countries hosting them. Financing that, as Israel suggests, will be through an international fund where Israel will be among the countries that supervise it without Israel’s bearing any meaningful material burdens. For it is the Arab oil -producing countries and the Western countries which are the main parties responsible for financing the fund and the process of refugees settlement.
  • One need not go into the details of the negotiations about the Palestinian refugees and displaced persons within the framework of the two permanent committees that emanate from the bilateral and multilateral tracks of negotiations. It can be safely said, however, that the Israeli stand with regard to these two questions has not undergone any change except from the perspective of those who see a change in Israeli attitudes compared with its tactical proposals while it sticks to its principal constants as regards the Palestinian refugees and displaced persons. For example, these people see in Israel’s acceptance to negotiate these two issues at the final stage of negotiations a change in Israeli vision and political behavior towards both, even after its utter principle – based and practical refusal to discuss them. It is only the American side and its satellites (whether these are states, governments, political or media forces and activities) who see in Israel’s agreement to placing the Palestinian refugees and displaced persons on the negotiation agenda of the two permanent committees, as a genuine change in Israeli attitude compared with former Israeli visions and positions.

     But a quick look through the Palestinian/Israeli negotiations file with regard to these two issues and within the framework of the two permanent committees reveals that such a transformation about which some parties talk is non-existent except in their imagination. This so – called transformation was only displayed for tactical reasons and simply to mislead American and European public opinion and to produce much ado about nothing. Meanwhile, Israel persists in going ahead with the same Israeli policy formulated long ago towards the Palestinian refugees and displaced persons. The constituent elements of the Israeli position towards Palestinian refugees and displaced persons in both bilateral and multilateral negotiations can be summarized as follows:

  • Israel insists that it is the Arabs who are responsible for the emergence of the Palestinian refugee   problem and for its remaining unsolved until now because of the Arabs’ refusal of the Partition Plan of the year 1947 and because of the war they waged against the then newborn Jewish State.
  • Lack of serious Arab attempts to solve the refugee problem and the Arab persistence on using it as political weapon in the Arab confrontation and conflict with Israel.
  • The rise in the numbers of the Palestinian refugees is caused by the Arab “aggressive wars” against Israel and particularly in the aftermath of the June 1967 War which is known in the media and academic circles as the Six – Day War.
  • Israeli continued policy of mixing the bag by its emphasis on the issue of those whom it calls “Jewish refugees” and estimates their number at 800,000 Jewish refugees and 580,000 of whom left the Arab countries and headed for Israel where they were assimilated and absorbed into the Israeli society, as Israel claims.
  • Israel says it is necessary to solve the problem of the Palestinian and Jewish refugees through exchange of population which, according to Israeli claims, has been practiced in several cases in world history, especially as the Security Council Resolution No. 242 of 1967 includes “Jewish refugees”, according to Israeli allegations.
  • Israel insists on non-admission or non-recognition of the right of the Palestinian refugees covered by Resolution 194 for  the year 1948, as this would mean “a national suicide” for the Jewish State.
  • Israel finds it necessary to solve the Palestinian refugee problem in the light of the Israeli solution for those whom it calls “Jewish refugees” (Jewish immigrants) as a model to be followed in dealing with the problem of the Palestinian refugees and reaching a solution therefor.
  • The reparations principle must also cover “Jewish refugees”, which means taking into account the Jewish property problem in the Arab countries when discussing Resolution 194 of the year 1948.
  • The only solution for the Palestinian refugee problem lies in settling them in the Arab countries where they are residing and assimilating them within their societies exactly as Israel has done in its dealing with the “Jewish refugee” problem. But Israel seems to overlook the fact that this reveals the double standard of Israeli political behavior. For it regards assimilation of the Jews in their native societies a taboo that must be obstructed by all means, even if it leads to the use of violence. It did this through Zionist Jewish cooperation with Western imperialist powers in Europe, as was the case with Nazi Germany, before the rise of the Zionist state as well as with Egypt and Iraq and other Arab countries before and after the establishment of this State.
  • Israeli obstruction of any specific and clear – cut acceptable definition of the term “displaced person” by all participating parties. For from an Israeli perspective, displaced persons are those who left the West Bank and Gaza Strip during the 1967 War and  whose number does not exceed two hundred thousand.(29) The Arab side, on the other hand, considers that displaced persons are “all those who were outside the occupied territories on June 5, 1967 as well as all those who left because of and after the war including holders of expired permits and deportees.”(30) Pursuant to the Arab definition of displaced persons, their number according to Arab estimates is 1,200,000. Here, it becomes manifest that Arab/ Israeli disagreement concerning displaced persons covers both parties’ understanding of displaced persons, their number and the ways and mechanisms of the solution of the Palestinian displaced persons’ problem.
  • Israel insists that settlement is the optimal solution of the Palestinian displaced persons’ question. Therefore, Israel tries to persuade the Arab side of the necessity of solving the Palestinian displaced person’s problem through settling most, or at least some of them, in their Diaspora countries, an approach which is supported by U.S.A., the European Union and Canada.
  • Israel insists on approaching the displaced persons issue within the framework of the terms “admission” and “assimilation or integration” and not within the framework of the term “return” as provided for by the Security Council Resolution 237 of the year 1967, which is concerned with the Palestinian displaced persons.
  • Israel refuses to issue an Israeli declaration of intentions or principles that includes its acceptance of the return of refugees in accordance with the Security Council’s Resolution No. 237 of the year 1967, which Israel refuses to explicitly refer to in the final statements of the Quartet Committee.
  • Israeli methodical attempts to deprive the displaced persons’ issue of its term of reference and works for gradually divesting this issue of its international legitimacy, not to mention Israeli versatility of using generalized terminology capable of diverse interpretations.
  • Concentration of Israel on reducing the Palestinian displaced persons’ issue to the process of “family reunion” for humanitarian reasons, provided that they would not exceed five thousand displaced persons per year(31) while the Palestinian side put this figure at one hundred thousand annually.
  • Israeli circumvention of the Security Council Resolution 237 of the year 1967, and emptying it of its content under the pretext of security reasons and reasons related to the absorptive capacity of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, especially as their number is unknown, and so are their wishes and priorities. This makes Shimon Peres feel that this presents an obstacle on the way of reaching an agreement on their return and requires “dealing with all the aspects of the question…”(32). What is odd in this regard is that the Palestinian stand agrees with the Israeli vision of the limited absorptive capacity of the West Bank and Gaza Strip!!
  • Israeli insistence on renegotiating the resolutions of international legitimacy instead of negotiating the mechanisms of their implementation. This is an Israeli/U.S.  policy, which has been bolstered after the Madrid phase and the disequilibrium of power at Arab, regional and international levels, which tilted completely in favor of Israeli negotiators.
  • Emphasis on the improvement of the conditions of refugees and displaced persons. Because from an Israeli – American – European point of view, this constitutes a step forward towards the implementation of the “strategy” of settling them in their Diaspora countries.(33)
  • Emphasis on implantation and dissemination of a spirit of despair and frustration among Palestinian refugees and displaced persons in a manner that makes them less immune and less resolute. This is done through avoidance of perpetuation of the tragic condition and sufferings of the refugees and displaced persons. For this tragic situation of the Palestinian refugees and displaced persons perpetuates their historic rights. But there are people who think that the failure of the refugees to obtain their rights, foremost of which is the right of return and compensation, would lead to frustration, despair, surrender to the fait accompli and acceptance of what is offered after they have lost their immunity and ability to resist in the long run. This is feared most by the refugees in Lebanon who believe that “failure to give them their rights to work, residence, education and health as well as the poor and defective services in their communities and the miserable life they lead is aimed at forcing them to submissively accept what is offered at a time when they have lost the power to refuse.”(34)
  • Encouragement of Palestinian refugees and displaced persons’ emigration to Canada, Australia and U.S.A. and facilitation of this emigration, which Israel views as an effective means of solving the problem of the Palestinian refugees and displaced persons.(35)
  • Working for crossing off the refugee issue from the agenda of negotiations whether within the framework of the Quartet Committee (second track) or within the multilateral framework. This is used as a preliminary step to cancel its international frame of reference as an issue for negotiation and not for implementation.
  • Benefiting from U.S. hegemony over the world and the sequestration of the latter’s decision – making in an endeavor to dismantle the Arab/Israeli conflict frame of reference and particularly to neutralize relevant international legitimacy resolutions concerned with the Palestinian refugees and displaced persons issues, the most important of which is Resolution No. 194 of the year 1948, The importance and gravity of that lies in the fact that the U.S.A. itself is a major factor in the formulation of that frame of reference, on the one hand, and that Israel itself is the illegitimate offspring thereof, on the other hand.

The theme of this symposium is “Refugees and Displaced Persons Issue and the New World Order.” The U.S.A. is the nominal name of this world order. Consequently, it is necessary to touch, even briefly, upon the American stand vis-a-vis the Palestinian refugees and displaced persons’ problem. We aim thereby to find out how congruent American and Israeli visions are and to forecast the future prospects of these two issues in the light of that. Without being mired into the international dimension of these issues.

The American Vision

To put it very briefly, the American vision of the Palestinian refugees and displaced persons’ issue is based upon the following, which comprises the constituent elements of the American perspective:

  • Evident and absolute American bias towards the Israeli vision and proposals while taking care to formulate that American bias with misleading terms and cover it with formal frameworks which say that in their multilateral framework that negotiations will be confined to the humanitarian sides and dimensions of the Palestinian refugees issue while posting other political subjects such as the right of return, reparation or resettlement to the bilateral stage of negotiations.
  • Restriction of the work of the permanent committee to provide data about displaced persons because of the Arab/Israeli conflict and about “expelled Jews” from the Arab countries, the “hurt Lebanese citizens” and the “Syrian Druzes” as well as other displaced persons as a result of the conflict. In other words, the floating of the displaced persons issue to make it like a bag that can accommodate everything and be too narrow and crowded for everything at one and the same time.
  • Concentrating the discussions on identification of mechanism for improvement of living conditions of the refugees and the role of the regional and international powers to make this plan succeed without prejudice to the final status of the permanent comprehensive settlement. By this means the situation completely conforms with the Israeli vision and stand and completely ignores the Palestinian/Egyptian vision. The latter is based on confining the work of this committee to the Palestinian refugees issue. It should not expand or float this issue in a manner that includes all refugees of the world. In addition, things will be muddled up and the real vision of the issue disappears.
  • Reduction of the international frame of reference of the Palestinian refugees solely to the Security Council Resolutions 242 of the year 1967 and 338 of the year 1973 in a preliminary step towards gradually getting rid of the burden of the international legitimacy, which places de jure restrictions on Israeli and American political behavior. The most significant of the resolutions were the UN General Assembly Resolution No. 194 of the year 1948 and the UN Security Council Resolution No. 237 of the year 1967 that deal specifically with the Palestinian refugees.
  • The U.S. leaning towards the Israeli concept of the definition of the refugee and displaced persons, and Israeli estimates of their numbers and the suggested solutions of the refugees and displaced persons issues.
  • U.S. concentration on the transfer of the Middle East file management and responsibility from the United Nations Organization to the bilateral and multilateral negotiations.
  • U.S. abstention from annual voting on the UN General Assembly Resolution No. 194 to confirm it as a frame of reference for negotiations, which was met with Israeli satisfaction vis-a-vis  a verbal dissatisfaction from the Arab side.
  • U.S. adoption of fabricated standards to bring about the change in Israeli vision and stands concerning the Arab/Israeli conflict issues and, particularly, the Palestinian refugees and displaced persons issues based on measurement of tactical Israeli propositions in accordance with the basic constants of its policy. This was designed to make Israeli acceptance of putting Jerusalem, refugees and other issues on the agenda of the final status negotiation look as if it were a substantive transformation as compared with its continuous principled refusal to discuss such issues.

Israeli Vision of the Future of the

Palestinian Refugee Problem

From the above exposition of the Israeli vision and negotiating policy with regard to the Palestinian refugees and displaced persons, it can be said that the consecration of the Israeli occupation of the whole of Palestine remains the pivot of the Israeli political behavior. For this reason, Israel in its negotiations with the Palestinian and the other Arab parties is keen on excluding each and everything that would harm its Judaization strategy or its existence, security and future. In this respect, the refugees issue comes first and the displaced persons’ issue comes second of the concerns of the Israeli policy, which had followed two tracks:

Track One

The International Legitimacy (Legal Level) Track

At the international legal level, Israel’s policy pivoted around the realization of the following objectives:

First:

Abrogation of the frame of reference of the right of return and reparations, which was guaranteed by the relevant international legitimacy resolutions. Most significant of these was the UN General Assembly Resolution No. 194 of the year 1948 and the Security Council Resolution No.  237 of the year 1967 pertaining to the displaced persons and resolution No. 242 of the year 1967 pertaining to the refugees. It is an old – new Israeli policy with the most significant success of which was the repeal of the UN General Assembly Resolution No. 3379 of the year 1975 which stipulates that Zionism is a form of racism. Israel was able to do this because of the disequilibrium which has befallen the regional and international balance of power and owing to U.S.A.’s hegemony over the will  and resolutions of the international community in the aftermath of the end of the Cold War with the collapse of the Soviet Union. We should add here also that the removal of Iraq from the confrontation arena with Israel after Iraqi capabilities were destroyed by the 30 – state war of aggression led by the U.S.A. under the pretext of the liberation of Kuwait on January 17, 1991.

In this connection, the racism resolution has adversely touched upon the essence of the racist thought of Zionist Judaism and its Israeli entity. Thus, Israel became feverishly active to cancel it in collusion with Washington because Israel views Resolution No. 194 of the year 1948 as exposing its fabricated artificial cover and so seriously damaging to its social fabric that it threatens the very existence thereof. Hence, also is Israel’s insistence on getting rid of this resolution and dropping it as frame of reference for the negotiations concerned with the Palestinian refugees.

Secondly:

Working for the annulment of anything reminiscent of the Palestinian refugees issue that keeps it alive in the Palestinian, Arab and international memory and conscience. Foremost among that is the UNRWA which she moved its head office to Gaza and cut down its material allocations in a preliminary step towards crossing it out.

Thirdly:

Transfer of the negotiations regarding the Palestinian refugees and displaced persons from the United Nations Organization to the bilateral and multilateral frameworks, i.e. abrogation of the United Nations jurisdiction including all its various institutions in the management of the Arab/Israeli conflict with its different dimensions and issues, the core of which is the Palestinian issue.

Fourthly:

Renegotiation of the international legitimacy resolutions relating to the Arab/Israeli conflict, in general and the Palestine Question as well as the resolutions related to the right of return and reparations, in particular, instead of making the negotiations concentrate on the mechanisms of implementation of international legitimacy resolutions.

Fifthly:

Continued emphasis on political and moral absolution of Israel from the emergence of the Palestinian refugees and displaced persons issue. For the whole responsibility is placed upon the Arab countries because they rejected the Partition Resolution of the year 1947 and waged war against Israel in the year 1948.

Track Two

The Track of Solution Plans for the Settlement

of the Palestinian Refugees

and Displaced Persons Issues

 

Israel maintains that the solution of the refugees and displaced persons problems can be achieved only through:

First:

Settlement of the whole refugees in the Arab states and their assimilation in their Diaspora societies. The same, as Israel sees, applies to the displaced persons. For most of them, or at the very least some of them, have to be settled in the countries on whose territories they live.

Secondly:

Encouragement of the emigration of the Palestinian refugees and displaced persons to Australia, Canada and U.S.A., in the first place, and to the European Union countries, to a lesser degree, and facilitation of the process of their migration thereto.

Thirdly:

Adoption of the principle of “family reunions” at minimal levels and for humanitarian reasons.

Fourthly:

Funding the settlement and integration or assimilation processes through an international fund to be established for this purpose with a capital that comes from Arab – oil producing countries and industrial countries, on condition that Israel will be a member of the international body that supervises the management of this fund. The same applies to financing the reparations.

To conclude, it can be said that the Israeli vision is the one that controls the path of negotiations with regard to refugees and displaced persons within their bilateral and multilateral frameworks. The situation will remain so until the balance of power changes in favor of international legitimacy discourse. This, however, is unlikely under the present regional and international circumstances which mostly serve the interests of the Zionist entity, thanks to the almost identical Israeli and U.S.A. visions and given that the latter completely controls the will and resolutions of the international community.

But this unilateral U.S.A. policy, which is totally and unreservedly biased towards Israel, has its dire consequences for the U.S.A. and its vital interests. This American policy in fact prepares the optimal ground and convenient climate for the plantation and the production of “terrorism” which seems to have succeeded in carrying the conflict to the American arena itself and has forced U.S.A. into a war against it. But will the future keep working in favor of the enslavement or of the liberation forces without never confusing terrorism with legitimate resistance of foreign occupation with its various tools and its diverse levels??

This remains to be seen and to be answered by the future coming days, sooner or later!!!

Footnotes

1- For more details see Roger Garody, The Myths Underlying Israeli Policy; translated by Hayat al-Huwayk, Amman 1997.

2- Dr Edward Sidhum, Mushkilat al-Laji’in al-Arab (The Problem of Arab Refugees), al-Dar al-Qawmiyyah li al-Tiba’ah, Cairo, 1963, p. 22.

3- Ibid.

4- Ibid.

5- Umar Abu al-Nasr, Jihad Filastin al-Arabiyyah (Struggle of Arab Palestine), p. 85.

6- Quoted from Dr. Edward Sidhum, op.cit.

7- Benny Morris, Expulsion of the Palestinians and the Birth of the Refugee Problem, an Israeli Document, Dar al-Jalil for Publication   of Palestinian Studies and Researches, Amman 1stedition, 1993, p. 11.

8- For more details see Benny Morris, op.cit.

9- Nur al-Din Masalhah, “al-Tasawwur al-Sahy?ni li “al-Tarhil”: Nazrah Tarikhiyyah ‘?mmah” (the Zionist Conception of “Transfer”: A General Historical Outlook), Palestinian Studies Journal, Beirut, No 7, 1991, p. 19.

10- Abduh al-Asadi, “Qadiyyat al-Laji’in al-Filastiniyyin min al-Manz?r al-Israeli” (Palestinian Refugees Question from an Israeli Perspective), in Samid Magazine, No 105, July, August, September, 1996, p. 109.

11- From al-Ra’i (Jordanian Newspaper), No. 11350, October 6, 2001.

12- Among the most prominent pioneers of Zionist Judaism advocating the policy of deportation and substitution were Baron Edmond Rothschild, Theodor Herzl, Max Nordau, Israel Rangwill, Yehushwa, Bokmeel, Leo Motskin, Nehman, Sirkin, Arthur Robin, Aharon, Ahronson and Menahem Usseshkin.

13- Quoted from Abdullah al-Asadi, op.cit., p. 111.

14- Cf. op.cit., p. 112.

15- Ibid.

16- Ibid.

17- Cf. op.cit., p. 113.

18- Ibid.

19- Cf. op.cit., p. 114.

20- Cf. op.cit.

21- Shlomo Gazit, “Palestinian Refugees Question: Permanent Solution from Israeli Perspective”, Palestinian Studies Journal, No 22, 1995, Beirut, p. 78.

22- Ibid.

23- C.F. Makram Yunis, “al-Mashru’at al-Israeliyyah li Tawtin al-Laji’in” (Israeli Plans for Refugees’ Settlement) (1967-1978), Palestinian Affairs Journal, No 86, 1979, Beirut, P. 108.

24- Abduh al-Asadi, op.cit. pp. 115 ff.

25- Al-Diyar Newspaper, Beirut, April 21, 1995.

26-            Palestinian Refugees: Facts and Statistics. The Official Site of the Palestinian National Authority. http: /www./pna.arabicrefugees,Factfile1htm.

27- Ibid.

28- Abduh Al-Asadi, op.cit., p. 119.

29- Muhammad Khalid al-Az’ar: “al-Taswiyah al-Siyasiyyah wa Qadiyyat al-Laji’in al-Filastiniyyin” (Political Settlement and the Palestinian Refugees Question) in Samid al-Iqtisadi, No 105, 1996, p. 59.

30- Muhammad Khalid al-Az’ar, op.cit.

31- Cf. Shimon Peres’s Statement. Sahifat al-Sharq al-Awsat (London Middle East Newspaper), May 9, 1995.

32- Ibid.

33- Muhammad Khalid al-Az’ar Daman?t Huq?q al-Laji’in wa al-Taswiyah al-Rahinah (Refugee Rights Guarantees and the Present Settlement). Cairo Center for Human Rights, Cairo 1996,  p. 24.

34- Ibid. p. 24 See also Yunis al-Sayyid “al-Laji’?n fi Lubnan Bayna al-Taswiyah wa al-Tahjir” (Refugees in Lebanon Between Settlement and Deportation), London Middle East Newspaper, July 14, 1994.

35- Cf. Suzan Tarboush, ” Filastiniyyu Lubnan fi Qalaqihim al-Mutajaddid”. (Lebanon’s Palestinians in their Renewed Anxiety”. London al-Hayat Newspaper, March 4, 1994.

References And Bibliography

1- Abul Naser, Omar. “The Struggle Of Arab Palestine”.

2- Al-Asadi, Abdoh.” The Expulsion of the Palestinians and the Birth of the Refugee Problem”,Dar Aljaleel for Publication and the Palestinian Studies and Researches”,Amman, first edition,1993.

3- Al-Azaar, khalid. “The Political Settlement and the problem of the Palestinian Refugees”. Al-Samid Al-Iqtisadi, No. 105, 1996

4- Al-Azaar, Mohammad Khalid. “The Guarantees of the Rights of the Refugees and the Settlement”:  The Cairo centre for the Studies of Human Rights; Cairo,1996.

5- Al-Sayyed,Yunis. “The Refugees in Lebanon Between the Settlement and Transfer”. The Middle East Newspaper, London,14 July 1994.

6- Garody, Roger. “The Mythical Foundations of the Israeli policy”, Amman, translated by Hayat AlHowik,1997.

7- Gazit, Shlomo:”The Question of the Palestenian Refugees: the  Permanent Solution from an Israeli  Perspective”, Palestinian Studies Journal No:22/1995, Beirut.

8 – Masalah, Noor Edden.” The Israeli Concept for Transfer : An overall Historical Outlook” Palestinian Studies Journal, Beirut,Issue 7-1991.

9 –  Morris, Benny:” The Expulsion of the Palestinians and the Birth of the Refugees problem : an Israeli Document “, Dar- Aljaleel for the Palestinian Studies and Research , Amman ,first edition ,1993.

10- Peres, Shimon. “The Middle East Newspaper”, London,9 may 1995.

11- Peres Shimon: “A press interview with the Israeli, “Maariv” newspaper,whose translation was puplished in the Jordanian newspaper –“AlRai”, No:11350 dated 6 October,2001.

12- Sayyidhum, Edward. “The Problem of the Arab Refugees”, AL-Dar Al-Qawmiyah For Printing, Cairo,1963.

13- Tarboosh, Susan.”The Palestinian of Lebanon in Their Renewed Worry”, Al-Hayat newspaper,London,4 march1994.

14-  Yunis, Makram:”The Israeli Plans for the Settlement of the Refugees: 1967-1978”.

Palestinian Issues Journal, Beirut, No:86-1979.

15 – “Al-Diyar” newspaper, Beirut, 21 April 1995.

16- “The Palestinian Refugees : Facts and Statistics” the official site of the  Palestinian National Authority  for Refugees, page 2 .