The Palestinian refugee lie

*The Palestinian refugee lie*

By Dror Eydar, Israel Hayom

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*On various fronts, the IDF is currently fighting within what are called "refugee camps", whose continued existence has only perpetuated the conflict and serves to this day as a weapon to criticize Israel in the world • Here are some facts to dispel the web of lies.*

Read the whole article here:

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1.

*At the end of World War II in 1945, around one million Jews lived in Arab countries.* They had resided in the region for around 2,500 years, dating back to the Babylonian exile in the sixth century BCE. These Jews were either expelled or fled following the establishment of the State of Israel and the wars that ensued. Most of them were absorbed by Israel. *Today, only a few thousand remain in Arab countries and in Iran, and most of them live under threat.*

Following the United Nations Partition Plan on November 29, 1947, and the outbreak of war after Israel's establishment on May 14, 1948, many Palestinian Arabs heeded their leaders' calls to leave the land for a few weeks until the Jews were slaughtered and the land was 'cleansed,' after which they would return to a 'clean' country. Others fled out of fear, and a few were expelled. In November 1948, the UN established a special organization to provide humanitarian relief to these refugees. Shortly thereafter, the UN Economic Survey Mission for the Middle East recommended resolving the refugee issue by resettling them in Arab countries through integration into industrial and agricultural projects. This is how the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) was born.

When it comes to the conflict with Israel, it seems that the world is familiar only with the Palestinian refugee narrative. However, *alongside the roughly half a million Palestinians displaced by the war, there were approximately one million Jews expelled from Arab countries* following the establishment of the State of Israel and its subsequent wars. The UN did not assist the Jewish refugees; instead, the young state of Israel, with its minimal resources, managed to absorb them. Not only were there more Jewish refugees, but the property they left behind after they were expelled or forced to flee without being allowed to take their possessions, was of far greater value – amounting to many billions of dollars.

2.

*Here's a fact: the UN has two refugee agencies. One is the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), which deals with refugees worldwide; the other is UNRWA, which exclusively deals with Palestinian refugees.* The significant difference between the two lies in the definition of who is a refugee. This definition determines eligibility for aid or compensation; it also has far-reaching implications concerning refugee status and the "right of return", especially when it comes to the number of refugees whose status requires resolution.

The Refugee Convention, formulated after World War II and which served as the basis for establishing the UNHCR, defines a refugee as someone forced to flee their country due to political persecution or violation of civil rights. Later, this definition was expanded to include those fleeing war, violence, or even economic hardship that prevents children from obtaining an education. This definition applies to Jewish refugees from Arab countries and, theoretically, could also include Palestinian refugees. But that would be a mistake.

*UNRWA's definition of Palestinian refugees is "persons whose normal place of residence was Palestine during the period 1 June 1946 to 15 May 1948, and who lost both home and means of livelihood as a result of the 1948 conflict." Interesting. Why is two years of residence sufficient to be considered a refugee uprooted from one's homeland, especially when Palestinian Arabs claim they have lived in the area since time immemorial?* According to this definition, a resident of Sudan or Morocco, for example, who came to Palestine in 1943 seeking work and fled due to the war, qualifies as a Palestinian refugee.

3.

The 20th century witnessed hundreds of millions of people displaced and resettled elsewhere. Even if the Sudanese or Moroccan individuals were considered refugees, after one or two generations, the issue should have disappeared, as the refugee status of all displaced persons worldwide applies to the refugees themselves and not to their descendants. *However, absurdly, UNRWA's refugee definition is that refugee status is inherited, even for those absorbed into other countries*. A great-grandchild of a Sudanese refugee, for example, who lived in the country for two years before Israel's establishment and now resides in Rome with Italian citizenship, is still counted as a Palestinian refugee and enjoys the same rights as someone who was recently uprooted. Thus, the number of refugees has grown from around half a million in 1948 to five or six million 'refugees' today.

*This does not stem from concern for the refugees but rather from the desire to fuel hatred against Israel and sustain the Palestinians' dream of flooding Israel and destroying it through what they call the 'right of return.'* The UN is responsible for this disgrace, and its misdoings do not stop there.

The current war has shown not only that UNRWA has not and will not solve the refugee problem, but perpetuates it also by fostering hatred of Israel and Jews in the textbooks used in the schools under its supervision. Worse still, UNRWA employees actively participated in the October 7 massacre. Even the UN admitted it once saw the evidence. Following these revelations, voices have grown louder worldwide to close the agency and transfer the responsibility for Palestinian refugees to the UN's general refugee agency.

4.

*Here's another fact: most refugees in the Middle East are not Palestinians*. In the past decade alone, more than ten million Syrian refugees have been displaced due to the civil war in that country. In the 20th century, hundreds of millions of people were displaced due to wars. For example, millions of Sikhs and Hindus moved from Pakistan to India and vice versa during the 1950s, despite the population's objections. In 1960, Pakistani President Muhammad Ayub Khan expressed hope that his country's resettlement of around seven million refugees from India would serve as an example for resettling Palestinian refugees in Arab countries.

In 1913, Turkey and Bulgaria exchanged populations, and in 1923, Turkey took in 350,000 Turks from Greece, while Greece took in over a million Greeks from Turkey. After World War II, millions of Germans were moved from territories in Europe back to Germany. The examples are numerous.

Unlike the Palestinian refugees – who, to qualify as refugees, needed only two years of residence before Israel's establishment – the Jews expelled from Arab countries had lived there for thousands of years, as mentioned above, ever since the Babylonian exile in the sixth century BCE. *The exchange of populations between Jewish refugees and Palestinian refugees would have been logical. Israel absorbed its refugees, and the Arab countries were expected to do the same.* Except for Jordan, which granted citizenship to Palestinian refugees who now make up the majority of its population (indicating that Jordan is the Palestinian state), the rest of the Arab states left the refugee camps and their residents in place to use them as a weapon against Israel.

5.

Philip Hauser, a population expert from the University of Chicago, represented the United States on the UN Commission on Population and Development from 1947 to 1951. He stated that the exchange of populations between departing Arabs and incoming Jews was a reality. He noted that some see the Arab states' refusal to accept refugees as a deliberate means to destroy Israel. While refugees worldwide are often forced to live in a new, culturally alien environment, Palestinian refugees live in Arab countries where they have access to a common culture and language.

It is hard to avoid the thought that Palestinian refugees received a special refugee agency with conditions and definitions that no other refugee in the world has, simply because they were up against the Jewish state. Think about the Jewish refugees – does anybody remember them? Nearly two thousand years ago, our sages said, "Anyone who distresses Israel will become the chief." Were it not for the desire to harm the Jews, the fate of the Palestinian refugees would be like that of hundreds of millions of refugees worldwide. After a generation, they would have been absorbed into their new homes and forgotten.

*In 2014, when ISIS committed genocide against the Yazidis, the world barely defended them. I recall seeing a picture of a Yazidi woman holding a sign that read: "The Yazidi's problem is that our enemies are not Jews..."*

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In the photo: Jewish refugees from Aden in Yemen on their way to Israel after the establishment of the Israel.