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Found 101 matches for palestinian refugees
An Unusual Revolution: The Palestinian thawra in Lebanon, c. 1969-82
In 1969, Palestinians across Lebanon declared that they were carrying out a revolution in their refugee camps. Nationalist militants known as fidaiyyin* ousted state security authorities from the camps and took charge themselves, asserting control over access and services. The new status quo was codified in the Cairo Agreement, signed the same year between the Lebanese government and Yasser Arafat’s Fatah organisation. Around the same time, the fidaiyyin took control of the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO), previously overseen by the Arab League, and established the infrastructure of a pseudo-state in exile. Until the Israeli invasion and siege of Beirut in 1982, the PLO not only trained thousands of fighters but also provided healthcare services, ran social clubs, and organised cultural facilities in refugee camps across the country. Numerous Palestinian refugees and nationalist leaders, along with a range of historians and sociologists, have termed this period al thawra al filastiniya (‘the Palestinian revolution’), or simply the ‘days of the thawra’ – revolution.
Refugees, exiles, and other forced migrants in the late Ottoman Empire
Refugee studies rarely address historical matters; yet understanding ideas about sanctuary, refuge, and asylum have long roots in both Western and Eastern history and philosophy. Occasionally the Nansen era of the 1920s is examined or the opening years of, say, the Palestinian refugee crisis is addressed. But by and large the circumstances, experiences, and influences of refugees and exiles in modern history are ignored. This article attempts to contribute to an exploration of the past and to examine the responses of one State – the late Ottoman Empire – to the forced migration of millions of largely Muslim refugees and exiles from its contested borderland shared with Tzarist Russia into its southern provinces. The article focuses on one particular meta-ethnic group, the Circassians, and explores the humanitarian response to their movement both nationally and locally as well as their concerted drive for assisted self-settlement. The Circassians are one of many groups that were on the move at the end of the 19th century and their reception and eventual integration without assimilation in the region provide important lessons for contemporary humanitarianism.
Palestinian refugee youth: agency and aspiration
Palestinian refugee youth living both within and outside of United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) camps in the Middle East are the focus of this article. For more than half a century, these youth have been captive for stereotyping, and they have been objectified as passive victims, much as their parents and grandparents before them lived without the benefit of international protection. Yet Palestinian youth, throughout the five UNRWA field sites, consistently express a willingness to act to improve their situation as well as a cautious and measured optimism for their future. Given the appalling poverty of many refugee youths’ lives, the prolonged low- and high-intensity armed conflict, and the structure of violence in the home, in schools and in daily encounters with occupation forces as well as Palestinian security, it is remarkable that Palestinian youth continue to maintain a sense of agency against all odds and hold on to aspirations for a better personal and community future.
Dispossession and Displacement: Forced Migration in the Middle East and North Africa
This volume explores the extent to which forced migration has become a defining feature of life in the Middle East and North Africa. The papers present research on refugees, internally displaced peoples, as well as 'those who remain', from Afghanistan in the East to Morocco in the West. Dealing with the dispossession and displacement of waves of peoples forced into the region at the end of World War I, and the Palestinian dispossession after World War II, the volume also examines the plight of the nearly 4 million Iraqis who have fled their country or been internally displaced since 1990. Papers are grouped around four related themes--displacement, repatriation, identity in exile, and refugee policy – providing a significant contribution to this developing, highly pertinent area of contemporary research.
Introduction/Epilogue
This volume explores the extent to which forced migration has become a defining feature of life in the Middle East and North Africa. The papers present research on refugees, internally displaced peoples, as well as 'those who remain', from Afghanistan in the East to Morocco in the West. Dealing with the dispossession and displacement of waves of peoples forced into the region at the end of World War I, and the Palestinian dispossession after World War II, the volume also examines the plight of the nearly 4 million Iraqis who have fled their country or been internally displaced since 1990. Papers are grouped around four related themes--displacement, repatriation, identity in exile, and refugee policy – providing a significant contribution to this developing, highly pertinent area of contemporary research.
Invisible refugees and/or overlapping refugeedom? Protecting Sahrawis and Palestinians displaced by the 2011 Libyan uprising
This article examines the experiences of two North African and Middle Eastern refugee populations (Sahrawis and Palestinians) affected by the 2011 conflict in Libya who have remained largely invisible to the international community. The challenges that they have faced since the outbreak of violence in February 2011, and the nature of international responses to these challenges, highlight a range of interconnected issues on both conceptual and practical dimensions. After outlining the scale and nature of the internal and international displacement arising from the 2011 conflict, and the history of these refugees’ presence in Libya, the article explores whether Sahrawis and Palestinians can be categorised and conceptualised as ‘refugees’ in Libya, given their ‘voluntary’ migration to the country for educational and/or employment purposes. Drawing on a number of historical examples of protection activities by UNHCR for Sahrawi and Palestinian ‘refugee-migrants’, the article explores the potential applicability of a framework that highlights ‘overlapping refugeedoms’ without negating refugees’ agency. Given that neither population has a ‘country of origin’ or effective diplomatic protection, the article then explores which state and non-state actors could be considered to be responsible for their protection in this conflict situation. Finally, analysing the ‘solutions’ promoted for Sahrawi and Palestinian refugees in this context leads to an assessment of whether such responses can be considered to offer effective protection to these populations. Ultimately, the article examines a range of protection gaps that emerge from these groups’ experiences during the 2011 North African uprisings, arguing in favour of a critical assessment of the protection mechanisms in place to support refugees who ‘voluntarily’ migrate for economic and educational purposes. Such an evaluation is particularly important given policy-makers’ increasing interest in presenting mobility as a ‘fourth durable solution’.
Conflicting missions? The politics of evangelical humanitarianism in the Sahrawi and Palestinian protracted refugee situations
This paper analyses the contradictory motivations, actions and implications of a network of American Evangelical organizations which is actively involved in humanitarian and political projects directly affecting two groups of protracted refugees in the Middle East and North Africa: Sahrawis and Palestinians. Following a brief introduction to typologies and key characteristics of ‘faith-based’ and ‘Evangelical’ humanitarian organisations, this paper examines how, why and to what effect American Evangelical groups provide relief aid to Sahrawi refugees in their Algerian-based refugee camps, and vocally advocate in favour of the Sahrawi quest for self-determination over the Western Sahara before the US Congress and the United Nations. While this first mode of Evangelical humanitarian and political intervention explicitly invokes a human rights discourse and international legal frameworks, the second case-study underscores the ways in which these same actors effectively render Palestinian refugees invisible, implicitly negating international law and UN resolutions enshrining their right to return and the right to meaningful Palestinian self-determination. Ultimately, the paper addresses the implications of these contradictory Evangelical interventions through reference to international humanitarian principles, interrogating the proposed ‘humanitarian,’ ‘political’ and ‘religious’ dynamics in such initiatives.
When the self becomes other: representations of gender, Islam and the politics of survival in the Sahrawi refugee camps
This volume explores the extent to which forced migration has become a defining feature of life in the Middle East and North Africa. The papers present research on refugees, internally displaced peoples, as well as 'those who remain', from Afghanistan in the East to Morocco in the West. Dealing with the dispossession and displacement of waves of peoples forced into the region at the end of World War I, and the Palestinian dispossession after World War II, the volume also examines the plight of the nearly 4 million Iraqis who have fled their country or been internally displaced since 1990. Papers are grouped around four related themes - displacement, repatriation, identity in exile, and refugee policy - providing a significant contribution to this developing, highly pertinent area of contemporary research.
No refuge: Palestinians in Lebanon
Suleiman’s paper sets out the restricted legal, political, economic and social conditions within which Palestinian refugees in Lebanon are forced to live. More than any of the other four populations under the UNRWA mandate, Palestinian refugees in Lebanon are deprived of basic civil and human rights. In the aftermath of the Nahr el-Bared debates regarding its rebuilding and the possible association with tawteen, Suleiman maintains that Palestinians in Lebanon do not wish to be naturalised or integrated; they do not wish to give up their claims to Palestine but simply seek to “mitigate their destitution and alleviate their day-to-day suffering.” The paper by Mansour and Yassin places the rebuilding of the Nahr el-Bared camp within the current concerns on the ‘global war on terror’ and the securitisation debates which link refugees to threats to national security. The paper asks whether post-conflict reconstruction is designed to restore refugee protection - as the state claims - or to implement greater control, confinement and exclusion. Using Foucault’s framework of governmentality, it analyses the Lebanese state’s protection and reconstruction policy and practice over Nahr el-Bared camp. It concludes that, while the reconstruction plan for the camp in strictly technical terms is a model of innovation, it has serious implications for the rights and protection of refugees.
Unprotected among brothers: Palestinians in the Arab world
This paper aims to trace the political and legal ripple effects of the Nakbah – the mass displacement of Palestinians from historic Palestine beginning in 1948 – for those refugees who found refuge in Arab states outside the bounds of international attempts at their assistance and protection. It will present a legal and political analysis of ‘protection gaps’ – in short, the lack of international and national protection that should, in principle, be guaranteed to all refugees. In doing so, this paper explores the relation between the foreign policy agendas of autocratic Arab states and their domestic policies, which are aimed at controlling and, often, marginalizing Palestinian refugees. It argues for a layered and intertwined political and legal analysis, with particular emphasis on the impact of autocratic governance on human rights and the role of foreign policy in host state treatment of Palestinians.
Palestine online: an emerging virtual homeland?
Prompted by Palestinians’ recent occupation of cyberspace as a new terrain on which to conduct their struggle, this paper is an inquiry into the existence of a virtual Palestinian homeland online. It traces the initial process of inscription of the land of Palestine with the meaning of ‘homeland’ at the turn of the twentieth century, comparing that process with Palestinians’ online activities. Drawing on Walter Benjamin’s theory of storytelling (1936) and Pierre Nora’s concept of the distinction between lieux and milieu de memoire (1989), it assesses how Palestinians’ storytelling practices of ‘emplacement’ several generations before exile inform our understanding of Palestinian refugees’ storytelling in cyberspace today. It argues that, while insufficient to replace Palestinians’ original homeland or to satisfy their political aspirations, ‘virtual Palestine’ does exist and offers a window into visions of a future homeland as expressed by Palestinians not usually heard from.
Disseminating findings from research with Palestinian children and adolescents
For more than half a century Palestinian children and their care givers have lived a temporary existence in the dramatic and politically volatile landscape of the Middle East. These children have been captive to various sorts of stereotyping, both academic and popular. They have been projected, as have their parents and grandparents, as passive victims without the benefit of international protection. And they have become the beneficiaries of numerous humanitarian aid packages based on the Western model of child development and the psychosocial approach to intervention. In January 1999, a research project examining the impact of prolonged forced migration and armed conflict on the lives of Palestinian children and young people was initiated in Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, the West Bank and Gaza. The project had several goals. One was to bridge the theoretical and applied divide common to much of the research directed at Palestinian refugees in the Middle East. Another was to test and challenge some of the Western medical and developmental assumptions concerning child and adolescent development. A third was to engage in multi-disciplinary, participatory research to draw out the similarities and differences between Palestinian refugee communities separated for more than 50 years by the national borders of different states.
Conference Report: The Politics, Human Rights and Security Implications of Protracted Refugee Situations
The two-day workshop, sponsored by the Alchemy Foundation and the United Nations University, brought together a range of experts from UNHCR, the World Bank, NGOs, states and academia with the aim of developing a framework for comprehensive solutions to protracted refugee situations (PRSs). The eventual output from the workshop will be an edited volume and a policy briefing paper that is intended to influence states, intergovernmental organizations and the work of the new Peace-Building Commission. The workshop divided into two parts: the first day on thematic papers, and the second on case studies. The thematic papers considered the relationship between asylum policy and PRSs, historical precedents, durable solutions, the relationship between PRSs and conflict and security, and the roles of humanitarian actors, development actors, and civil society. The case studies included contributions on the situation of Afghan, Somali, Southern Sudanese, Palestinian, Bhutanese, and Burmese refugees. The papers themselves are to be published in book form by the middle of 2007. This summary highlights the main discussions and the way in which they have advanced the debate on PRSs. Reflecting the aim of the project, which is primarily to influence policy and to effect change, the summary divides into three areas: conceptual, normative and institutional, and political.
Development and protection challenges of the Syrian refugee crisis
The Syria Regional Response Plan 6 (RRP6) 2014 provides an increased focus on early recovery, social cohesion interventions and a transition from assistance to development-led interventions, alongside the continuing large-scale humanitarian assistance and protection programme. In a region already hosting millions of Palestinian and Iraqi refugees, the scale of the Syrian crisis is putting immense additional strains on the resources and capacities of neighbouring countries and the international humanitarian system. The 3,300 refugees on average arriving in neighbouring countries every day in 2014 place a large burden on the protection capacity of the host countries and international actors and further accentuate the already severe negative social, economic and human developmental impacts on the host countries of the region.With no prospects of the civil war abating in Syria and with a peace process that might encourage refugee return even further away, the displacement is becoming protracted.
Ensuring quality education for young refugees from Syria (12-25 years): a mapping exercise (summary)
This policy note provides an executive summary of the RSC research report, 'Ensuring Quality Education for Young Refugees from Syria (12-25 years): A mapping exercise'. This research focuses on access to education by refugee youth, a crucial yet often overlooked element in the humanitarian response to the Syrian crisis. Outlining educational demand and supply, the report analyses good practice and gaps in education services for refugee youth from Syria (including Palestinian, Kurdish and Turkmen refugee youth) in Jordan, Lebanon, Northern Iraq/Kurdistan Region of Iraq and Turkey. This publication was supervised by Professor Dawn Chatty.
Palestine at the UN: the PLO and UNRWA in the 1970s
This article examines the relationship of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) during the 1970s, the period when the PLO reached the zenith of its power in Palestinian refugee camps throughout the Levant. Based on archival United Nations (UN) and UNRWA documents, as well as the PLO's own communications and publications, the article argues that the organization approached its relationship with UNRWA as part of a broader strategy to gain international legitimacy at the UN. That approach resulted in a complex set of tensions, specifically over which of the two institutions truly served and represented Palestinian refugees. In exploring these tensions, this article also demonstrates how the “question of Palestine” was in many ways an international issue.
Politics resettled: the case of the Palestinian diaspora in Chile
Resettlement needs to be better understood as a political event and process. Along with repatriation and local integration, it is considered one of three traditional ‘durable solutions’ for refugees, with ‘success’ typically assessed by whether resettled refugees are provided with the tools they need to achieve ‘integration’ in their new ‘host-state’. Yet, how much do we understand resettlement beyond these policy-oriented categories? It is no secret that resettlement is an inherently political tool at the national and international level. And with increasingly stricter immigration policies in the West, attention has shifted to emerging resettlement actors, such as Latin American countries, to fill protection gaps. Although states are essentially in full control over who they admit, they are not the only actors with distinct (political) interests in relation to being engaged and involved in resettlement processes. The gradual withdrawal of states from resettlement has been followed by the creation of alternative roles for civil society. For example, migrant(/refugee) communities provide assistance to others from that group to adapt in their new host countries and are essentially portrayed as resources for integration akin to any NGO. Overall, there is a lack of understanding about what this ‘co-national resettlement support’ represents for refugees and their communities alike, and about the (political) significance of such support. In 2008, 117 Palestinian refugees were resettled to Chile from Iraq. In parallel to the ‘formal’ implementation of the project by the Chilean Government, UNHCR and their NGO partner the Vicaría, the long-settled Palestinian community supported their ‘compatriots’ by providing material and cultural resources. To merely focus on the relation of these practices to integration would obscure the fact that this participation was also highly politicised. Rather than positing the engagement of the ‘Chilean-Palestinian’ community as static and essentialised, this paper delves deeper into the motivations, worries and political repercussions that characterised their involvement in resettlement. It focuses on how the project was negotiated, framed and performed at both macro and micro levels by various actors within and peripheral to the Palestinian community in Chile. By conceptualising Chilean-Palestinians as a ‘diaspora’, I argue that the arrival of Palestinian refugees was an event where different (re-)formulations of (Chilean-)Palestinian identity and politics were centre stage. By using this project as a case study and applying diaspora theory as a framework, it becomes possible to elucidate the politics of resettlement and move beyond mere policy and state-centric considerations.
UNRWA and the Palestinian precedent: Lessons from the international response to the Palestinian refugee crisis
Considering the major refugee crises currently facing the world, this essay argues that an examination of earlier refugee crises is needed in order to devise an effective international response today. On this basis, it assesses the unique international system that was set up in response to one of the largest refugee crises of the twentieth century: that of the Palestinians. Like the Syrian refugee crisis today, the Palestinian case encapsulated the connection between global politics and mass migration. On this basis, this article evaluates the merits of the international organization responsible for serving the Palestinian refugees: the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA). Identifying and assessing the key features of the UNRWA system, the essay argues that its uniqueness generated both benefits and many disadvantages for the Palestinian refugees it served. In particular, the Palestinians’ ineligibility for UNHCR services has left them uniquely vulnerable when seeking international protection. Creating a similar international organization to serve Syrian refugees today is likely to cause similar problems, and will raise the question of whether other large refugee populations also need their own UN agencies. However, the internationalist rationale behind the UNRWA system is also contrasted harshly with the current imbalance in the response to the Syrian crisis, whereby a small number of countries are hosting the majority of the refugees. Thus despite its considerable flaws, UNRWA’s precedent still provides important lessons for the crisis today.
Rejecting resettlement: The case of the Palestinians
Palestinian rejection of resettlement was driven by political concerns. This case study shows the importance of engaging directly with refugees when devising durable solutions. Over their seven decades as a large-scale refugee population, the Palestinians have been remarkably consistent in collectively opposing resettlement as a durable solution to their plight. Both the grass roots and later the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) have repudiated any suggestion of third-country resettlement on the grounds that it would undermine the Palestinians’ political and national rights as a people. Host-country integration was similarly spurned.
Palestinian refuges
Book description: Across a 20th century marked by world wars, regional conflicts, rising and collapsing empires, and the dawn of globalization, the flow of immigrants and asylum seekers reached unprecedented levels. And though America was by far the most popular destination, immigration (voluntary and otherwise) affected virtually every corner of the globe and continues in record numbers today. A comprehensive and timely examination of the history and current status of immigrants and refugees—their stories, the events that led to their movement, and the place of these movements in contemporary history and politics. Immigration and Asylum: From 1900 to the Present is an accessible and up-to-date introduction to the key concepts, terms, personalities, and real-world issues associated with the surge of immigration from the beginning of the 20th century to the present. It focuses on the United States, but is also the first encyclopedic work on the subject that reflects a truly global perspective. With contributions from the world's foremost authorities on the subject, Immigration and Asylum offers nearly 200 entries organized around four themes: immigration and asylum; the major migrating groups around the world; expulsions and other forced population movements; and the politics of migration. In addition to basic entries, the work includes in-depth essays on important trends, events, and current conditions. There is no better resource for exploring just how profoundly the voluntary and forced movement of asylum seekers and refugees has transformed the world—and what that transformation means to us today.