al-Jazeera English has been broadcasting a special four-part series on al-Nakba (first broadcast on the Arabic-language network in 2008). The episodes are below.
[Episode 4: To post]
The documentary can also be found with French, German, Italian, and Portuguese subtitles on Youtube, as can the Arabic original.
A piece today by Moe Ali Nayel at Electronic Intifada (“Palestinian refugees are not at your service“) should be required reading for anyone doing work on Palestinian refugees, or indeed anyone researching war- and disaster-affected populations:
“Are you enjoying filming our misery? Film: it’s fine, you are like the others. You show up in the camp, film, leave, and we are still here.”
I used to reply: but we want to tell the world about your story. Always, with the same sarcasm, is the reply: “how much are you getting paid to tell the world our story?”
Throughout my time working as a fixer with international journalists I never understood why people on the sidewalks of the camps’ busy streets always regarded our “humanitarian” mission with skepticism. But earlier this year I came to understand this skepticism of Palestinian refugees in camps in Lebanon….
…
This has been the Palestinian refugees’ dilemma since 1948: watching groups of people from across the globe stroll through the misery of their camps and and then leave. Making their personal plight and stories available to writers and advocates is for them a way to induce change and action and to advance their moral cause around the world.
But humanity is the key here. To tell stories and conduct research, one would do well to remember that refugees deserve our sensitivity when dealing with their hardships. It’s been 65 years and Palestinians in the camps are still clutching onto whatever crumbs of hope or aid they can. But ultimately they are left awaiting the day they can return to the place where their dignity and humanity can be restored: Palestine.
Read the whole thing at the link above.
Haaretz today has a long piece today by doctoral student Shay Hazkani (New York University) on early Israeli government efforts to obfuscate the forced displacement of Palestinians in 1948.
The Israeli censor’s observant eye had missed file number GL-18/17028 in the State Archives. Most files relating to the 1948 Palestinian exodus remain sealed in the Israeli archives, despite the fact that their period as classified files − according to Israeli law − expired long ago. Even files that were previously declassified are no longer available to researchers. In the past two decades, following the powerful reverberations triggered by the publication of books written by those dubbed the “New Historians,” the Israeli archives revoked access to much of the explosive material. Archived Israeli documents that reported the expulsion of Palestinians, massacres or rapes perpetrated by Israeli soldiers, along with other events considered embarrassing by the establishment, were reclassified as “top secret.” Researchers who sought to track down the files cited in books by Benny Morris, Avi Shlaim or Tom Segev often hit a dead end. Hence the surprise that file GL-18/17028, titled “The Flight in 1948” is still available today.
The documents in the file, which date from 1960 to 1964, describe the evolution of the Israeli version of the Palestinian Nakba (“The Catastrophe”) of 1948. Under the leadership of Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion, top Middle East scholars in the Civil Service were assigned the task of providing evidence supporting Israel’s position − which was that, rather than being expelled in 1948, the Palestinians had fled of their own volition.
Ben-Gurion probably never heard the word “Nakba,” but early on, at the end of the 1950s, Israel’s first prime minister grasped the importance of the historical narrative. Just as Zionism had forged a new narrative for the Jewish people within a few decades, he understood that the other nation that had resided in the country before the advent of Zionism would also strive to formulate a narrative of its own. For the Palestinians, the national narrative grew to revolve around the Nakba, the calamity that befell them following Israel’s establishment in 1948, when about 700,000 Palestinians became refugees.
By the end of the 1950s, Ben-Gurion had reached the conclusion that the events of 1948 would be at the forefront of Israel’s diplomatic struggle, in particular the struggle against the Palestinian national movement. If the Palestinians had been expelled from their land, as they had maintained already in 1948, the international community would view their claim to return to their homeland as justified. However, Ben-Gurion believed, if it turned out that they had left “by choice,” having been persuaded by their leaders that it was best to depart temporarily and return after the Arab victory, the world community would be less supportive of their claim.
Most historians today − Zionists, post-Zionists and non-Zionists − agree that in at least 120 of 530 villages, the Palestinian inhabitants were expelled by Jewish military forces, and that in half the villages the inhabitants fled because of the battles and were not allowed to return. Only in a handful of cases did villagers leave at the instructions of their leaders or mukhtars (headmen).
Ben-Gurion appeared to have known the facts well. Even though much material about the Palestinian refugees in Israeli archives is still classified, what has been uncovered provides enough information to establish that in many cases senior commanders of the Israel Defense Forces ordered Palestinians to be expelled and their homes blown up. The Israeli military not only updated Ben-Gurion about these events but also apparently received his prior authorization, in written or oral form, notably in Lod and Ramle, and in several villages in the north. Documents available for perusal on the Israeli side do not provide an unequivocal answer to the question of whether an orderly plan to expel Palestinians existed. In fact, fierce debate on the issue continues to this day. For example, in an interview with Haaretz the historian Benny Morris argued that Ben-Gurion delineated a plan to transfer the Palestinians forcibly out of Israel, though there is no documentation that proves this incontrovertibly.
Even before the war of 1948 ended, Israeli public diplomacy sought to hide the cases in which Palestinians were expelled from their villages…
Despite the title of the article, the piece doesn’t really provide clear evidence of what Ben-Gurion knew or believed when, and what the balance was between outright falsification and “spinning” a narrative that Israeli leaders themselves found comfortable to accept as truth. Still, it is an interesting piece of research based on archival sources, and well worth reading.
Knowing when to be outraged by a map of the Middle East can always be confusing, as Ann Dismorr (Director of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency in Lebanon) recently discovered when she attended the official launch of two German-funded projects focused on water supply network improvement and shelter rehabilitation in Rashidieh Camp in southern Lebanon. During her visit, she was presented with an embroidered map by camp residents. Shortly thereafter, Palestinian Media Watch angrily condemned her:
At the official launch of two German-funded UNRWA projects in southern Lebanon, Director of UNRWA Affairs in Lebanon, Ann Dismorr, posed with a map that erases the State of Israel and presents all of it as “Palestine.”
The map includes both the Palestinian Authority areas as well as all of Israel. Above the map is the Palestinian flag and the inscription “Arab Palestine.” The text at the bottom of the map also says “Palestine.” The neighboring countries Egypt, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon are all named on the map as is the Mediterranean Sea. Israel is not mentioned or designated anywhere. Several places and cities, both in Israel and from the Palestinian Authority, are included on the map of “Palestine”: The Negev desert, Be’er Sheva, Rafah (Gaza), Hebron, Bethlehem, Jerusalem, Jaffa, Haifa, Acre, Tiberias and the Dead Sea.
The Times of Israel soon jumped on the bandwagon, a headline declaring “UNRWA erases Israel from the map.” Israel’s Ambassador to the United Nations, Ron Prosor, even sent a letter of complaint to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.
It wasn’t, of course, UNRWA that embroidered the map (although UNRWA senior officials do have many remarkable household skills). Moreover, as an UNRWA press release subsequently pointed out, the map showed pre-1948 Palestine—that is before the establishment of the modern state of Israel:
Statement attributable to UNRWA Spokesperson, Chris Gunness
14 May 2013
East JerusalemUNRWA categorically rejects accusations in the media that the Agency is “erasing Israel from the map” because its officials and stakeholders stood next to a map which does not show Israel. The map in question is an embroidery depicting a pre-1948 map and therefore ante-dates the creation of the state of Israel. The allegations are therefore completely false.
The organization that originated the accusation has made similar allegations in the past about UNRWA’s neutrality and was forced to retract after the agency showed them to be false.
I again request that any media organization making similar accusations check with us first before they go public with reports that have consistently been shown to be false.
This isn’t the first time that a UN agency has run into map problems—as previously reported on the PRRN blog, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs was criticized last year by some Palestinians for correctly labelling Israel as Israel on a map of the region. In 2011, UNRWA was accused of using Israel-denying globes in its refugee schools in Egypt (the fact that UNRWA has no schools in Egypt being, apparently, beside the point.)
Meanwhile, the Israeli Ministry of Tourism website continues to include tourist maps that erase most of UN observer state Palestine from the map altogether. As you can see from the map at right, there’s no hint of a Green Line around the West Bank (Judea and Samaria).
h/t Scott Brynen for the West Wing video
From al-Jazeera English, 14 May 2013.
For the Palestinian refugees living in Egypt, life is far from easy.
Roughly 3,500 of the estimated 70,000 Palestinian refugees in Egypt live in Geziret Fadel village.
They have built their mud-houses themselves and most are living subject to major restrictions on freedom to travel, access to healthcare, and education.
The majority of families can not afford to send their children to school, creating a generation of illiterate youngsters trapped in a cycle of poverty.
Despite this, many are just grateful to be allowed to stay in Egypt.
Al Jazeera’s Rawya Rageh reports from Geziret Fadel, Egypt.
In March of this year the University of Exeter hosted an expert policy simulation that examined the policy challenges facing UNRWA in the near future here. You can read about it over at PAXsims.
al-Jazeera English has featured a recent video report on the situation of Palestinian refugees who have fled Syria to Lebanon:
ANERA has just released a new report on the plight of Palestinian refugees who have fled the civil war in Syria to Lebanon.
About 85% of Palestinian refugees living in Yarmouk camp near Damascus have fled?
Over 37,000 refugees from Syria have moved into Lebanon’s already over-crowded Palestinian refugee camps?
More than half of these refugees have seen their homes in Syria destroyed?
In Lebanon over 90% have no income?
Most families live with more than 10 people crammed into a single room?
Most families depend on the generosity of other poor families to survive in Lebanon’s Palestinian refugee camps?
You’ll find the full report here.
Concerned, perhaps, that former Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon is no longer around to make anti-UNRWA videos, Hamas has stepped up to the challenge and made its own. Issam Adwan, head of the Refugee Affairs Department of the (Hamas-controlled) Palestinian government in Gaza posted one last month, warning against perils posed by trips that UNRWA has organized for Gaza school children to the US and Europe. As al-Monitor reports:
“The UNRWA yields to the demands of Western countries. It does not have our best interest at heart. Therefore, we ought to cautiously deal with its projects,” he said.
In the video, titled “UNRWA’s suspicious trips,” Adwan said that the movement has objected to the trips organized for adolescent students for five “psychological” reasons. According to the Islamic movement, “Students will be dazzled by these new places and would dream of returning there to enjoy themselves again. They would lose their sense of nationalism and become detached from their social values. They would feel a sense of defeatism and inferiority and would have difficulty adapting to reality and reintegrating into their society.”
As the al-Monitor report notes, the move comes amid recent UNRWA-Hamas tensions over changes in UN welfare programmes, as well as UNRWA’s decision to cancel its planned Gaza marathon after the Islamist movement refused to allow women to participate.
The latest Syria crisis update (23 March 2013) from UNRWA.
Regional Overview
Armed conflict in Syria continues to result in a rapidly rising death toll, displacement and compounded humanitarian needs. Armed clashes continue throughout Syria, particularly in Rif Damascus Governorate, Aleppo, Dera’a and Homs. As the armed conflict has progressively escalated since the launch of UNRWA’s Syria Crisis Response 2013, the number of Palestine refugees in Syria in need of humanitarian assistance has risen to over 400,000 individuals. The number of Palestine refugees from Syria who have fled to Jordan has reached 4,794 individuals and approximately 33,000 refugees are in Lebanon.
Syria
- Amongst the 65 reported deaths of Palestine refugees this week, UNRWA has learned of the violent deaths of five Palestine refugee children, one in Dera’a on 15 March and four others in the Damascus area on 19 March. Four of the children reportedly died as a result of the use of heavy weapons. (link to the press release)
- An UNRWA driver is missing and was last seen transporting food parcels from Homs to Hama;
- An UNRWA vehicle was stolen from a staff member’s residence in Khan Eshieh. There is a total of 19 UNRWA vehicles that have been stolen since the start of the conflict;
- Hostilities in southern Rif Damascus Governorate hit a high level of intensity at the beginning of the week with clashes and shelling affecting almost all camps in the area, including Yarmouk, Sbeineh, Seyeda Zaynab, Husseiniyah and Khan Dannoun;
- Intensive hostilities around eastern Damascus / Rif Damascus Governorate continued unabated including in the area of Ramadan camp resulting in 75 per cent of camp residents fleeing to adjacent locations;
- Armed conflict continues in various parts of Aleppo and around Neirab camp and the adjacent airport;
- Hostilities also continue in and around Dera’a, and for the first time in Jillien village resulting in severe restriction on operations throughout the southern area.
Despite high risk of exposure to violence in conflict-affected areas, since the start of the conflict in March 2011, UNRWA’s network of some 3,600 staff have delivered food parcels to 28,652 families as well as 36,843 blankets, 2,829 hygiene kits, and 14,502 mattresses. UNRWA has provided cash assistance to 73,076 families since the start of the conflict.
Currently, there are some 11,500 IDPs sheltering in UNRWA-managed facilities in Syria, of which nearly 8,000 are in UNRWA buildings (e.g. schools and training centres) that are being used as make-shift emergency shelters. The IDPs are dependent on humanitarian assistance for their basic food, NFI and health needs.
