Approximately 750,000 Palestinians were displaced and

became refugees as a result of the 1948 war which led to

the founding of Israel. None of these displaced persons
were ever allowed to return to the homes or
communities from which they were displaced and the
Palestinian refugee population has continued to grow in
the time that has passed since 1948. Today there are
more than 7 million Palestinian refugees scattered
around the world. The reality of Palestinian forced
displacement is at the core of the Palestinian experience
and the Palestinian refugee issue is at the heart of the
Palestinian-Israeli conflict. This paper provides
background information on the history of the
Palestinian refugee issue and the politics of the right of
return.

Who are Palestinian refugees?

A Palestinian refugee is any Palestinian who fled, was
expelled, or was forced into exile from his/her home in
the area of historic Palestine or who has been refused
reentry to their home in historic Palestine after having
traveled abroad during the period between 1948 and
today.[i] The Palestinian refugee population now
includes over seven million people.
The largest group of Palestinian refugees is made up of
Palestinians who fled or were expelled from their homes
as a result of the partition of historic Palestine in 1948 as
well as their descendants. As of 2014 this included
approximately 5 million refugees who are registered
with the United Nations Relief and Works Agency and an
additional one million Palestinians who were displaced
in 1948 but who could not or did not register with
UNRWA for assistance.[ii]
The second largest group of refugees is made up of
those Palestinians who were displaced for the first time
from their homes and communities in 1967 as well as
their descendants. There are approximately one million
Palestinian refugees from 1967.
The third group of Palestinian refugees includes
Palestinians who have been internally displaced, i.e.
Palestinians who were forced to flee their homes or
villages in 1948 and 1967 and who were not allowed to
return to their homes, but who remain present in either
Israel or the occupied Palestinian territories. At present
there are approximately 350,000 Palestinians who live
within the post 1948 borders of Israel and who hold
Israeli citizenship who were displaced from their homes
in 1948 and who are still not allowed to return to their
historic homes, villages, and land - all of which are
located within Israel’s post 1948 borders. An additional
130,000 Palestinians are people or the descendants of
people who were internally displaced in the occupied
Palestinian territory as a result of the 1967 War.[iii]
Finally, there are an unknown number of Palestinians
who have been expelled from or refused return to the
occupied Palestinian territory since 1967. This includes
people who have had their ID cards and residency
rights revoked, people denied family reunification, and
people who have been deported and exiled.[iv] This is a
process that is ongoing in the occupied Palestinian
territory and Israel through the processes of land
confiscation, forced displacement, home demolition, and
the revocation of residency rights.
What was the primary cause of Palestinian displacement in
1947 and 1948?
It is often claimed that Palestinians left their homes in
1948 voluntarily or at the behest of Arab leaders.
However, these claims are not supported by the historic
record[v] which show that the vast majority of the
750,000 Palestinians displaced in 1947 and 1948 fled
from their homes as a direct result of targeted violence
and threats to their safety.[vi] Many Palestinians who
fled attempted to return to their homes during or after
the end of the fighting but were blocked from returning
by Israeli forces.
The systematic displacement of Palestinians also began
well before the UN Partition Plan formally went into
effect on May 15th 1948, which is the date that marks the
beginning of formal hostilities between the Israeli
military and forces from surrounding Arab countries.
Violent conflict between Palestinians and Jewish forces
began as early as November 1947 and continued
unabated until May 1948. The early months of the
conflict witnessed limited back and forth violence
between irregular Palestinian forces and the much more
organize Jewish forces including the Hagganah, Irgun,
and Palmach.
The nature of the conflict changed dramatically in
February and March of 1948 when Jewish forces began
systematically depopulating Palestinian
communities. On February 15th 1948 all of the residents
of the villages of Qisarya, Barrat Qisarya, Khirbat Al-
Burj, and Atlit which are near present day Cesarea were
forced from their homes. This was the first time during
the conflict when villages were completely
depopulated. [vii] The practice of depopulating and
destroying Palestinian communities was turned into
official government policy by “Plan Dalet” which was
finalized by the pre-state Jewish leadership in March
1948. Plan Dalet outlined an explicit strategy for taking
over Palestinian communities and expelling the
Palestinian population, stating:
“…operations can be divided into the following
categories:
- Destruction of villages (setting fire to, blowing up,
and planting mines and debris), especially those
population centers which are difficult to control
continuously.
- Mounting combing and control operations according
to the following guidelines: encirclement of the village
and conducting a search inside it. In the event of
resistance, the armed forces must be wiped out and the
population must be expelled outside the borders of the
state.”[viii]
At the point when the United Nations Partition Plan
officially went into effect on May 15, 1948 between
250,000 and 300,000 Palestinians had already been
expelled from their homes and communities, including
most of the population of major Palestinian
communities such as Safed, Haifa, Acre, and Jaffa. These
numbers represent a majority of the Palestinian
population that lived in the area designated for the
establishment of a Jewish state by the United Nations
Partition Plan. After May 15th 1948 the War expanded
and Israeli forces took over portions of the territory that
was set aside for the establishment of a Palestinian state
through the Partition Plan and expelled much of the
population that lived in these areas. By the end of the
war approximately 750,000 Palestinians had been made
refugees and between 500 and 600 Palestinian villages
had been depopulated. Many of these communities
were later destroyed.
Why weren’t Palestinian refugees allowed to return to their
homes after 1948?
The Palestinians who were displaced in 1948 were not
allowed to return to the places from which they were
displaced because their presence was seen as a threat to
the maintenance of a sustainable Jewish demographic
majority in the new state. This was made clear to AFSC
during an August 9, 1949 meeting between AFSC
employee Don Stevenson and Eliahu Elath, the Israeli
Ambassador to the US. When Stevenson asked
Ambassador Elath if Israel would accept the return of
Palestinian refugees to their homes Elath told him that
Israel would not because “Israel would commit suicide
if she took back all the refugees.”[ix]
The reality is that without expelling the Palestinian
population that was present in areas set aside for the
establishment of a Jewish State by the U.N. Partition
Plan it would not have been possible to establish a state
with a distinct Jewish character and political culture.
Jews were only a slim majority of the population (55
percent Jewish vs. 45 percent Palestinian) in the area
proposed for the state. They also owned less than 10% of
the land in the area set aside for the new Jewish state
and were clear demographic minorities in both the
northern (Eastern Galilee) and southern (Negev) sectors
of the proposed state where they constituted
approximately 30 percent and 1 percent of the
population respectively. The Jewish population was
only a majority in the middle (coastal) section of the
proposed state, but even here 65 percent of the Jewish
population lived in the two cities of Tel Aviv and Haifa
meaning that Palestinians were the majority population
in nearly all of the area set aside for the new Jewish
State.[x]
Additionally, if the new state of Israel had attempted to
keep the land that it seized during the1948 War while
also allowing people displaced from these areas during
the 1948 war to return to their homes the Jewish
population of the new state would have been the
minority population. The decision to prevent
Palestinians from returning to their homes was therefore
not motivated by a fear of violence by returning
refugees, but rather was a decision made as the result of
the Israeli government’s recognition that allowing
Palestinian refugees to return would have turned Israel
into a bi-national state with a Jewish minority. Israel
could not have been established as a Jewish state
without the expulsion of the indigenous Palestinian
population.
Do Palestinians have a right to return to the places from
which they or their ancestors were displaced?
Palestinian refugees’ right to return to the homes from
which they were displaced is well established in
international law. The first source of support for
Palestinian refugees’ claims to a right of return is U.N.
General Assembly Resolution 194 (III) Of December
1948, paragraph 11, in which the U.N. General
Assembly,
“Resolves that the refugees wishing to return to their
homes and live at peace with their neighbors should be
permitted to do so at the earliest practicable date, and
that compensation should be paid for the property of
those choosing not to return and for loss of or damage to
property which, under principles of international law or
in equity, should be made good by the governments or
authorities responsible;
Instructs the Conciliation Commission to facilitate the
repatriation, resettlement and economic and social
rehabilitation of the refugees and the payment of
compensation…”
Since 1949, this resolution together with UNSC Res. 242
and 338 have been regularly reaffirmed by the U.N.
General Assembly.
The rights outlined in this resolution are firmly
grounded in international humanitarian, human rights,
and refugee law. According to the United Nations High
Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) Executive
Conclusion No. 40, “…the basic rights of persons to
return voluntarily to their country of origin is
reaffirmed and it is urged that international cooperation
be aimed at achieving this solution.”[xi] UNHCR’s
support for the right of return is based on the idea that
the right of return is a recognized customary norm of
international law which is included in the Universal
Declaration of Human Rights, the International
Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the International
Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial
Discrimination, and the Fourth Geneva
Convention.[xii]
Where are Palestinian refugees currently located, and what
rights are they granted in the countries where they reside?
The majority of Palestinian refugees continue to reside
in either the occupied Palestinian territory or
surrounding countries. Of the refugees registered with
UNRWA over 40% (approximately two million) live in
Jordan. More than one million (23%) UNRWA
registered refugees live in Gaza, nearly 760,000 (16%)
live in the West Bank, 462,000 live in Syria[1], and
approximately 420,000 live in Lebanon.[xiii] Refugees
not registered with UNRWA live in countries around
the world, with some of the largest refugee populations
located in Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Gulf Countries,
Chile, and the United States.
The rights granted to Palestinian refugees vary from
country to country. Palestinian refugees who are not
registered with UNRWA generally hold citizenship,
immigrant, or temporary resident status in the countries
where they are located. Their legal status is usually
consistent with other people holding their same legal
status in the country where they reside. The status of
UNRWA refugees in Lebanon, Jordan, and Syria is more
complicated.
In Jordan nearly 95% of all Palestinian refugees have
been given citizenship and are able to participate in
Jordanian political and economic life. Most registered
Palestinian refugees in Jordan (over 80%) also do not
live in the ten UNRWA run camps located in Jordan.
On the other hand, most Palestinian refugees in
Lebanon live inside UNRWA run camps and their rights
are severely restricted by the Lebanese government.
They have not been granted Lebanese citizenship and
are instead considered foreigners. They have almost no
political rights and are denied many social rights
including access to government run public services such
as education, healthcare, and social security. UNRWA is
the primary provider of these services to Palestinian
refugees in Lebanon. Palestinian refugees in Lebanon
are also blocked from obtaining employment in many
professions.
Prior to the recent Syrian civil war, Palestinian refugees
in Syria were integrated into Syrian society and were
granted access to government services and employment.
They were not granted citizenship however and their
rights to own property were limited. It is important to
note that many of the Palestinian refugees in Syria have
been displaced as a result of the Syrian war and
Palestinians who remain in Syria have suffered together
with other Syrians as a result of the war.
Palestinian refugees living in the occupied Palestinian
territory are subject to the same limitations on their
rights as are all Palestinians.
What are the Israeli, Palestinian, US government’s and
AFSC positions on the Right of Return?
Israel’s position on Palestinian refugees has not changed
since 1948. The Israeli government does not recognize
Palestinian refugees’ right to return and continues to say
that Palestinian refugees and their descendants cannot
be allowed to return to the homes and communities
from which they were displaced because their return
would be a threat to the maintenance of a continued
Jewish demographic majority in Israel.
The United States government has not officially come
out in support of the Israeli position and against the
right of return. However, throughout the negotiations
process US officials have pushed Palestinians to give up
and/or make the right of return symbolic.
Palestinians continue to hold that the right of return
must be addressed justly if the conflict is to be resolved.
AFSC also holds that Palestinian refugees’ right of
return must be recognized and justly addressed if the
conflict is to be resolved. Ending the occupation is not
enough. If the international community is serious about
resolving the conflict it must also recognize the central
importance of justly addressing the issue of Palestinians’
right of return. Anything less is a denial of justice and
will not resolve the conflict.
AFSC and Palestinian Refugees
Because of AFSC’s experience helping to resettle
hundreds of thousands of refugees and displaced
persons following World War II, during the fall of 1948
the United Nations asked AFSC to organize relief efforts
for refugees displaced by the 1948 War. AFSC accepted
this request while putting forward a number of
conditions including a demand that AFSC be allowed to
provide relief wherever it was most needed. The U.N. as
well as the Egyptian and Israeli authorities accepted
AFSC’s terms. However, as a result of the quick advance
of Israeli forces, AFSC’s field of operation was
eventually limited to Gaza.[2]
AFSC staff arrived in Gaza in December 1948 and began
coordinating relief and assistance efforts in January
1949. AFSC assistance included the setting up of camp
structures, the establishment of health clinics, feeding
operations, running schools, setting up other service
structures, and the registration of refugees. This work
continued until May 1, 1950 when the United Nations
Relief and Works Agency began its operations.
Following the 1967 war, AFSC reestablished a presence
in the occupied Palestinian territory, opening a child
education program in Gaza and a legal aid center in
Jerusalem for Palestinians living under Israeli
occupation. These programs continue as independent
NGOs under Palestinian leadership. AFSC subsequently
developed new programs in both Gaza and the West
Bank and our work continues today in both areas
through our offices and staff in Jerusalem and Gaza.
Regarding Right of Return, most recently AFSC has
organized with Zochrot a conference on the Practicalities
of Refugee Return held in Tel Aviv.