By Mohammad Awwad
RAMALLAH, July 30, 2018 (WAFA) – Efforts by the US Congress to pass a new law that recognizes only 40,000 Palestinian refugees instead of 5.2 million will not change anything on the ground because the rights of refugees are guaranteed by United Nations General Assembly resolutions, particularly 194 and 302, experts and officials said on Monday.
They told WAFA in separate interviews that the US move goes in line with Israeli policies that seek to erase the right of return of Palestinian refugees to their homes they were forced to abandon, and it is included in the so-called deal of the century.
Saeb Erekat, secretary general of the Executive Committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), said US efforts to draft a new law that recognizes only 40,000 Palestinian refugees instead of 5.2 million is unacceptable and illegal and will not affect the status quo.
He said that the move initiated by US Congressman Doug Lamborn "is an integral part of the deal of the century, which aims to discard the right of the refugees, and is consistent with the racist (Israeli) Nation-State Law, which is the cornerstone of that dubious deal."
Lamborn introduced to Congress last week the “UNRWA Reform and Refugee Support Act”, which claims that the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNWRA) was created "to help resettle nearly 600,000 Palestinians after the (1948) war. After 70 years of so-called resettling, UNRWA now claims there are 5.3 million Palestinian refugees in the world. By labeling descendants of those original refugees also Palestinian refugees, UNRWA has inflated its budget and created a refugee population in perpetuity."
The bill ensures that US "taxpayer dollars dedicated to refugees should only contribute to UNRWA to the extent that it resettles the original refugees from 1948, not the great-grandchildren."
UNRWA was created by a UN resolution after between 700,000 to 800,000 Palestinians were forced to leave their homeland when Israel was established in 1948 and who eventually became refugees in what was left of Palestine and neighboring Arab countries.
Erekat stressed that the rights of refugees are protected by UN Resolution 194, which cannot be bypassed. He said neither the US Senate nor Congress has the right to override international law and impose their laws on other countries.
He said that the administration of US President Donald Trump has cut off aid to UNRWA and now the Congress is trying to push for a new law that would reduce the number of Palestinian refugees, describing these acts as part of the US war against the Palestinian people by abolishing their right of return.
Erekat pointed out to the US administration‘s blind and unprecedented support for the ongoing violations by the Israeli government against the Palestinian people from killings, arrests, demolition of home, seizure of land and expanding settlements, which he said the whole world has rejected except the US.
Political analyst Ghassan Khatib said the US bill does not affect international law, because countries must enact their laws in accordance with international law and not the other way around. The origin is international law, he said.
He added that the reason behind this bill is clear: America is pursuing a policy of removing two issues from the negotiating table - Jerusalem and the refugees - by recognizing Jerusalem as the united capital of Israel and transferring its embassy to it, and the refugees by ending UNRWA through ending aid to it. "All the new laws are like this one; they are joint Israeli-American effort," he said.
Khatib said that all the law can do if approved is to be consistent with the reduction of US aid to UNRWA and nothing more.
He pointed to the possibility of Israel seeking to sell this law internationally, but it will not succeed, especially since the US recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel did not find acceptance in the world, especially Europe.
Abdul Hamid Siam, an expert in United Nations affairs, said the basis of the mandate and the issuance of international laws and resolutions comes from the United Nations and the General Assembly, as in the case of resolution 302, which has established UNRWA and which says that "the children of refugees are refugees and they stay as such as long as they do not return to their homes."
He said that single country can decide on international conventions, which will be considered in international politics as bullying and disregard for international law.
He pointed out that the new American bill is an implementation of Israeli policy through the US administration.
Siam explained that the bill would fail as the recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel has failed. Israel and the US will try to sell it as part of the deal of the century, but it will be difficult to pass it, especially after the failure to sell recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel.
M.K.
