update:Campaign for the Defense of Palestinian Refugee Rights
Report: RETURN RALLY National Committee of the Internally Displaced,
Nazareth, 11 March 2000. On Saturday, 11 March, internally displaced Palestinians in Israel joined Palestinian refugee communities in exile to reaffirm the right of return. "No peace with Israel without the implementation of our right to return to homes and properties" is the demand which mobilizesnot only millions of Palestinian refugees in the Arab and western exile, but also the approximately 250,000 Palestinians who have remained - displaced and disowned - inside Israel.
The public Rally for the Right of Return, organized by the National Committee for the Defense of the Rights of the Internally Displaced in the sports hall of the Nazareth municipality, was attended by some 850 participants - activists from displaced communities, Palestinian political parties and movements, representatives of Palestinian local councils and public institutions in Israel, as well as solidarity delegations from the occupied Syrian Golan Heights, from refugee camps in the occupied West Bank, and the PLO.
Jaradat/BADIL - addressed two major common themes:
The determination of Palestinian refugees and internally displaced to continue the struggle for their right of return ("with my teeth I will cling to my land…" in the words of the late Palestinian poet Tawfiq Zayyad), which is expressed in the current series of popular conferences and rallies launched in all parts of Palestine: al-Far'ah (1995), Bethlehem (1996), Gaza (1996), Tulkarem (1999), and in Nazareth (1995 and 2000);
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"I was 21 years old then. They took a group of 10 men, lined them up against the cemetery wall and killed them. Then they brought another group, killed them, threw away the bodies and so on. I was waiting for my turn to die in cold blood as I saw the men drop in front of me." Fawzi Tanji, refugee from Tantura Reuters (19/1/00) |
The need for united Palestinian action towards a solution of the Palestinian refugee question, the core issue of the Palestinian/Arab - Israeli conflict, based on the implementation of international law and UN Resolutions, especially UN Resolution 194 (Right of Return). As a step towards the required united action, Mayor Jeraiyseh announced on behalf of the Arab Monitoring Committee that the right of return of internally displaced Palestinians will feature as the central issue of the public events organized on this year's Palestinian Land Day (30 March 2000). Atty Wakim Wakim and Suleiman Fahmawi speaking on behalf of the National Committee for the Defense of the Internally Displaced presented the Committee's Manifesto and clarified that:
The National Committee is the representative of the internally displaced Palestinians in Israel, while the PLO is the sole representative of the Palestinian people, including internally displaced Palestinians; Any political agreement signed by the PLO with Israel
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Internally Displaced Palestinians Affirm their Right to Return to their Homes and Lands MANIFESTO We, the some 250,000 internally displaced, part of the Palestinian Arab minority, citizens of this state, did not fall from the sky. We are not immigrants, but natives in our land. The Israeli government is not allowed - on ethic, moral, legal, and political grounds - to keep us displaced in our homeland, far from our towns and villages of origin. International law and principles protect our natural right of return. n We warn the Israeli government not to neglect our issue and demand that our file will be opened. We demand the cancellation of the Absentee Property Law which defines us as "Present Absentees", as well as the cancellation of all other laws providing or ethnic discrimination, and to return the displaced to their homes. The National Committee demands its right to maintain the
holy sites in all destroyed villages and to protect our historic
sites. We call upon all Palestinian national institutions,
political parties, and our people to stand on our side. As
part of the entire Arab-Palestinian people, we wish to declare: While internally displaced Palestinians are part and parcel of the Palestinian people represented by the PLO as its sole legitimate representative, the National Committee for the Rights of the Internally Displaced represents the needs and interests of the internally displaced Palestinians in Israel. We warn of the consequences of conspiracies against Palestinian refugee rights, whether conducted openly or behind closed doors. We state with loud voice that there will be no just solution without a solution of the issue of the refugees and the internally displaced. Internally Displaced Palestinians Affirm their Right to Return to their Homes and Lands MANIFESTO National Committee for the Rights of the Internally Displaced |
The speakers of the National Committee called for broad support of the internally displaced by all Palestinian social and political institutions, for the immediate adoption of the file of the internally displaced by the Palestinian leadership, and for a joint and intensive effort at documentation of Palestinian eviction and displacement during the 1948 Nakba. Israeli guest speaker Tedi Katz, summarized his research findings on the previously poorly documented Israeli massacre in the Palestinian village of Tantura in which at least 200 Palestinians were killed.
He drew the attention of the audience to the fact that mosque and graveyard of Tantura were ploughed and transformed into a sea-side parking lot - a measure which strongly contradicts Israeli sensitivity to the desecration of Jewish graveyards all over the world. He emphasized that no Israeli government interested in peace will be able to escape the refugee question and reminded the audience that accurate documentation of destroyed villages and lost properties is a precondition for a strong Palestinian argument and negotiations in the future.
If the history of the 530 Palestinian villages destroyed and depopulated in 1948 is not recorded now, while eye-witnesses are still alive, they will be lost forever.
The Rally's cultural program expressed Palestinian refugees' determination to return in emotional terms. The Saffouri dance-theater group gave an artistic account of the search for a lost village. Deheishe camp's IBDA'A children again succeeded to move the audience by depicting Palestinian persistence in their struggle against all odds, as well as the power of the young Palestinian generation, ready to take up and complete the cause of their parents and ancestors