SANA'A June 25. 2024 (Saba) - Since the Zionists set foot on the pure land of Palestine, the issue of Palestinian refugees has been the focus of the Palestinian issue, as the Nakba against an entire people has become the main witness to one of the largest ethnic cleansing operations in the 20th century, and to the largest ongoing political and humanitarian tragedy since the year 1948 until the present day.
Today, June 20 of each year, marks World Refugee Day(WRD), which was approved by the United Nations General Assembly in 2000, and which is dedicated to introducing the refugee issue, highlighting their suffering , needs, examining ways to support , assist them amid the increasing crises and numbers of refugees.
According to Palestinian data available to the Central Office of Statistics, more than 6.4 million Palestinian refugees are still registered with the Relief and Relief Agency in Palestine , the Diaspora, and are suffering from asylum as a result of their forced displacement from their lands during the Nakba of 1948.
70 percent of the Palestinian people in the world are considered refugees, with one out of every three refugees in the world considered a Palestinian refugee, and half of the Palestinian refugees do not have citizenship, but for many decades the usurping entity deprived them of their right to return to their homeland in flagrant violation of UN Resolution No. 194. Issued by the United Nations General Assembly, at a time when it facilitated the immigration of Jews to the occupying entity without restrictions or conditions.
Over 76 years after the displacement of Palestinians from their cities and villages located in historic Palestine in 1948, the number of refugees registered with the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) increased from 750,000 to more than 6.4 million refugees.
Over the past decades, a number of Palestinian refugees from the diaspora countries and the Palestinian territories have moved to live in other Arab countries such as Iraq, the Gulf states, European countries, or within the United States.
There are no statistics or figures documenting the numbers of refugees living in places outside the five UNRWA areas of operations, while the Academy of Refugee Studies issued an “infographic” report documenting the numbers of Palestinians around the world until mid-2022, in which it said that the number of Palestinians living in Foreign countries amounted to about 800 thousand; Without specifying the number of refugees among them.
Palestinian refugees lack their most basic human rights, suffer from a lack of protection , appropriate international assistance, bear the brunt of the occupation and its occupation practices.
Since 1967, the Zionist entity has forcefully expelled more than 726,000 Palestinians or forced them to forcibly leave their houses and land. They became refugees immediately before and after the announcement of the establishment of the Zionist occupation entity. This entity’s arbitrary policy against the Palestinians, their cities, villages, and property resulted in the flight of many.
During the Zionist military occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip in 1967, approximately 300,000 Palestinians were displaced, some of whom headed to neighboring countries and others settled in camps or cities and villages inside Palestine. Since the same year, the Palestinians have continued to face policies of displacement and forced uprooting from their land, which included the demolition of Houses, forced evictions, land confiscation, withdrawal of residency rights, construction of settlements, and the annexation and expansion wall, in addition to the massive military presence supporting these policies.
In a statement on the occasion published on its website, the United Nations this year focused on the theme of “solidarity with refugees,” whether by welcoming them and integrating them into our societies, calling for the adoption of policies that protect and support them, or working to find solutions to their plight.
This occasion comes a week after the revelation of new data issued by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees regarding the rise in the number of forcibly displaced people around the world to an unprecedented level of 120 million people. It also gives us an opportunity to show support for those forced to flee due to conflicts and persecution.
UNRWA records indicate that the number of Palestinian refugees registered with it in January 2022 was about 5.9 million Palestinian refugees, including about 2.5 million in the West Bank , Gaza Strip, and thus they constitute about 42 percent of the Palestinian refugees (15 percent in West Bank compared to 27 percent in the Gaza Strip).
At the level of Arab countries, the percentage of Palestinian refugees registered with the UNRWA in Jordan reached about 40 percent of the total Palestinian refugees, while in Lebanon and Syria this percentage reached about eight percent and ten percent, respectively.
These estimates represent the minimum number of Palestinian refugees, considering the presence of unregistered refugees, as this number does not include Palestinians who were displaced after 1949 until the eve of the June 1967 war - according to UNRWA’s definition - and it also does not include Palestinians who left or were deported in 1967. The background of the war and those who were not refugees in the first place.
The percentage of the refugee population in the State of Palestine was about 42.2 percent of the total Palestinian population residing in the State of Palestine in 2017. 26.3 percent of the population in the West Bank are refugees, while the percentage of refugees in Gaza Strip was 66.1 percent.
With the continuation of the Zionist-American aggression against the Gaza Strip since October 7, 2023, the number of Palestinian refugees is doubling every day, especially in the Gaza Strip.
In a statement on the occasion, the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) affirmed that the ongoing battle of “Al-Aqsa Flood” has, with all force, determination and valor, restored the issue of Palestinian refugees to its global presence, as a just and legitimate issue, and has thwarted all attempts by the Zionist enemy and its supporters to obscure, obliterate or cancel it, and has brought the people’s journey closer. The Palestinians towards comprehensive liberation and a near return, God willing.
In its statement, the movement stressed to me that the right of all refugees from Palestine to return to their houses from which they were forcibly displaced, unjustly, and aggressively displaced is a sacred right, passed down through Palestinian generations, and not subject to waiver or negotiation.
The movement called on the United Nations, the international community, all countries hosting Palestinian refugees, all human rights and humanitarian institutions, to assume their responsibilities in protecting the rights of refugees from the Palestinian people, enabling them to live a free and dignified life on their land, and supporting their steadfastness and struggle.
One third of the Palestinian refugees registered with UNRWA, or more than 1.4 million refugees, live in 58 recognized refugee camps in Jordan, Lebanon, the Syrian Arab Republic, Gaza Strip and the West Bank, including occupied Al-Quds.
The socio-economic conditions in the camps are generally characterized by poverty and density population, cramped living conditions, and inadequate infrastructure such as streets and sewage.
Ten camps were established following the June 1967 war and the Zionist enemy’s occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, with the aim of sheltering a new wave of displaced refugees and non-refugees.
The other two-thirds of Palestinian refugees live in and around cities and villages in host countries, in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, often in areas surrounding official camps.
In a recent report, the United Nations announced that the Zionist war on Gaza led to a rise in the unemployment rate in the besieged Palestinian Strip to about 80 percent. While the United Nations Labor Agency said that the war “caused the loss of jobs and livelihoods on a large scale.” While the gross domestic product decreased.
It is worth noting that the Palestinian refugee issue is one of the most important contemporary issues within the scope of international refugee law. However, this issue has witnessed weakness and fragility in terms of legal care and protection as a result of the narrow interpretation of the rules of international refugee law by the parties responsible for providing that legal protection and care for Palestinian refugees.
J.A
resource : SABA
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