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Who are the Palestinians, why are they frustrated and what do they want?
1. WWhhoo aarree tthhee PPaalleessttiinniiaannss??
WWhhyy aarree tthheeyy ffrruussttrraatteedd??
AAnndd wwhhaatt ddoo tthheeyy wwaanntt,, aannyywwaayy??
Peter Larson
Chair
National Education Committee
on Israel/Palestine
National Council on Canada-Arab
Relations (NCCAR)
11. In the famous movie “Exodus”,
Paul Newman is leading a group
of Jewish refugees to “Palestine”.
It is set in 1947.
12. Where is
Palestine
today?..
In 1948, after 2000
years, Palestine is no
longer on the map
13. Who were the Palestinians?
- Social structure
Up to 1948, the area was mostly feudal/agrarian
• Olives, oranges, sheep, goats
• Lots of small villages, absentee landlords
• 20% lived in a dozen cities (Jerusalem,
Jaffa, Haifa, Nablus…) with educated urban
population
Palestinian orange harvest, Jaffa, 1920
14. Who were the Palestinians?
- religion
• Population of Palestine (1914)*
• 657,000 Muslim
• 81,000 Christian
• 59,000 Jews
_____________
TOTAL 800,000 million
* est. J. McCarthy
Population 1931
•760,000 Muslim
•91,000 Christian
•174,610 Jews
____________
•1,026,000
* British Census, 1931
17. The Nakba
(Nov 1947 – August 1948)
• 750,000 Palestinians fled for safety
• not allowed to return
• all their land was confiscated by Israel
(without compensation) and held “for the
Jewish people”
• They call this “the Naqba” (the disaster”)
18. Where are the
Palestinians today?
1. West Bank* 2.4 M
2. Gaza* 1.6 M
3. Refugees in Lebanon,
Jordan, Syria 3.5 M
4. Israel 1.4 M
5. Diaspora 2. M
Total 10.9M
* - More than one million of the
people now living in the WB and
Gaza are refugees from what is
now Israel.
19. Where are the
Palestinians today?
1. West Bank* 2.4 M
2. Gaza* 1.6 M
3. Refugees in Lebanon,
Jordan, Syria 3.5 M
4. Israel 1.4 M
5. Diaspora 2. M
Total 10.9M
* - More than one million of the
people now living in the WB and
Gaza are refugees from what is
now Israel.
20. What are their problems?
•Depends on where they live
• West Bank
• Gaza
• Refugee camps
• Israel
• Diaspora
21. West Bank
(2.4 million)
• Under Israeli military occupation since 1967
• human rights very restricted (Checkpoints,
passes, etc.)
• Ever shrinking territory (e.g. Jordan Valley)
• New Jewish settlements
• Israeli control and distribution of water
• Jews under different laws
Map: The Economist
22. This is one of the Jewish settlement s in East Jerusalem
23. Gaza
1.6 million
• 2/3 are refugees from 1948
• Gaza taken over by Israel in 1967
• Israel withdrew in 2004 but still
blockaded by land, sea and air
• economy blocked
• Elected Hamas government in
2006, but west refused to
recognize
• stuck on 360 km2, (15% of
Ottawa territory)
24. Refugees
4.7 million
• 58 camps in Syria,
Lebanon, Jordan
• (some in Gaza and
WB)
• some not in camps
• condition varies from
country to country
UNRWA definition: “anyone 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."
25. Israel
1.4 million
• those who stayed in
Israel in 1948
• citizens of Israel
( “Israeli Arabs”) with
some civil rights (e.g.
right to vote)
• own only 3.5% of land
• live in dozens of small
(poor) Arab towns
• Face severe
discrimination and
poverty
28. Diaspora
2 million??
• many moved to Middle
East, America and Europe
• about 50,000 in Canada
• many have never been to
Palestine
• main centers in Canada:
Toronto, London, Montreal,
Vancouver
29. What do they want?
Palestinians want their country back and
a recognition that what was done to
them was unfair.
Which way forward?
•a two state solution – two equal states
with secure borders
•a one state solution – a democratic
secular state with equal rights for all
What no representative Palestinian body asks for!!:
Kill the Jews, get rid of them, throw them into the sea, send them back to Europe, etc. etc.
30. How have they tried to
fight for their rights?
•UN resolution 194 (Dec. 1948)
– right of return
•Gamal Nasser
•PLO- Armed struggle
•Passive resistance
•Terrorism
•Negotiations
•Legal tools
•Appeal to UN (2012)
•BDS
31.
32. Conclusion:
Who are the Palestinians, why are they unhappy
and what do they want?
• The Palestinians are an Arab people who have lived in an
area called Palestine for the last 2000 years.
• They are unhappy because they were chased off their land
in 1948 and don’t have the right to return. While some
remain in Israel, most are now dispersed in Gaza, in the
West Bank, and in many other countires.
• They want the same thing as most of us – a country, land, a
house, economic opportunity for themselves and their kids.
• For the last 64 years they have tried every possible method
– from direct negociations, to UN votes and even individual
acts of terrorism. But so far, they have not been successful.
33. What are the main human rights
issues Canadians should be
concerned with?
1 Freedom for Palestinians living under
Israeli occupation.
2 Equality for Palestinians living inside
the Jewish State of Israel
3 A fair solution for the refugees
(repatriation, or resettlement and
compensation)
4 Protecting the human rights of Jews
living in Israel today
35. What can we do?
• Recognize this large, long-standing, man-made
humanitarian crisis
36. What can we do?
• Recognize this large, long-standing, man-made
humanitarian crisis
• Dare to break the “taboo”
37. What can we do?
• Recognize this large, unresolved, man-made
humanitarian crisis
• Dare to break the “taboo”
• Learn more
• Encourage our government (and opposition
parties) to promote a fair solution based on
Canadian values of human rights for all
38. WWhhoo aarree tthhee PPaalleessttiinniiaannss??
WWhhyy aarree tthheeyy ssoo aannggrryy??
……aanndd wwhhaatt ddoo tthheeyy wwaanntt,, aannyywwaayy????
Thank You!
Peter Larson
Chair
National Education Committee
on Israel/Palestine
peter.larson@nccar.ca
39. 7 Frequently asked questions
1.Why don’t the Arab countries do more?
2.Why don’t the Palestinians just ‘suck it up?”
3.Isn’t Israel a democracy? (At least its better than its
neighbours, isn’t it??)
4.Why do you focus on Israel when there are so many other
problems in the world?
5.Why is the Harper government so pro-Israel?
6.The Arabs and Jews have hated each other forever. Will it
ever end?
7.OK – I agree its unfair. But I’m not an activist. What can
I do?
40. If you want to know more….
1.Give me your email address, I will send you some ideas
for books/articles/films you might find interesting.
2.Sign up for my biweekly email
3.Think about coming with me to see for yourself.
•Thanks.
•Peter Larson, peter.larson@sympatico.ca
Notas do Editor
We hear a lot about the Israel/Palestine conflict
But don’t really know much about who the palestinians are, or what they want
We have an “image” of the palestinian terrorist but what’s behind the image?
This info is based on 3 trips to the region, whre I have talked to dozens of Palestinians and israelis about this complicated issue
Actually, Palestinians are a lot like us. They are quite varied.
Here are a few of them.
The first pic is one of Shawki Abu Ghazaleh, the President of the Rotary Club of Ramallah exchanging flags with some Canadian rotary club members
Below them are 3 girls who are university students in Jenin, in the West Bank. They are talking to a Canadian woman – who was returning to Palestine after 40 years. She was born in Haifa, Palestine, and now returns to Haifa, Israel.
The kids – like any kids – are hamming to get their pics taken. They are in Israel. They speak Arabic, they are muslim, they are Palestinian, but they are citizens of Israel.
The man on the top right is Izzeldin Abuelaish a doctor. You may have heard of him. He is the man who lost his 3 daughters to Israeli missiles during the attack on Gaza in 2009. He now lives in Canada.
Why should we care about the Israel/palestine conflict?
We should care about suffering anywhere
This conflict is one of the longest lasting – since 1948
It is a contributing factor to Muslim terrorism - 911, long line ups at the airport, even our soldiers being killed in Afghanistan is at least partly linked.
Canada has taken a very high profile on one side of this issue. Most recently, it has led to Canada’s almost total isolation at the United Nations
Since Roman times, the area between the Mediterranean Ocean and the Jordan River has been known as “Palestine”
The Crusaders went to “Palestine”
The Ottomans ruled over “Palestine” for 400 years
The British took over the Palestinian mandate in 1921
But in 1948, Palestine became “israel”
Hebrews, Philistines, Canaanites,
For over 400 years, the Venetian empire traded with all of the mediterranean. In the Doges Palace there is a map room, with many maps of the area. On the huge wall map, which dates from around 1700, the eastern end of the Mediterranean is marked “Palestina”
The Area between the mediterranean and the Jordan River was also known as Palestine under the British Mandate. Here is a map from the 1935 version of the Encyclopedia Britannica.
Also currency issued by the “Palestinian Currency board” in 1930.
After 2000 years of being known as “Palestine” that stopped in 1948 with the creation of the State of Israel.
As of November 29th, 2012, a State of Palestine has been recognized by the UN. But its borders are still not defined.
So what do we know about who the Palestinians were
From about 1500 to 1921, Palestine and the Palestinians were under the Ottoman empire
The Palestinian area was mostly feudal. A few large land owners (some of them living outside the area in lebanon or Egypt or Syria), and many many small villages.
The economy was based on agriculture – olives, oranges, sheep, goats, etc.
Some of the oranges were for export. In 1880 more than 1,000,000 oranges left the port of Jaffa for Europe
There were also a dozen or so cities – the largest of which were Jaffa and Jerusalem. The latter was the political/religoius capital of the area.
There have been Jews, Muslims and Christians living in Palestine for centuries.
The Jews tended to be concentrated in the cities – especially Jerusalem,
In 1867 an American Missionary reported an estimated population of Jerusalem of about 15,000, of whom 6,000 were Muslims, 5,000 Jews and about 2000 Christians. All were Palestinians. All spoke Arabic.
At the time, of the British Census of 1931, Jews comprised about 20% of the population.
In 1914 Palestine had a population of 657,000 Muslim Arabs, 81,000 Christian Arabs, and 59,000 Jews.
http://lostislamichistory.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/mandate.jpg
Estimated by US demographer Justin McCarthy
British Census 1931759,717 Muslims, 174,610 Jews, 91,398 Christians,
There is considerable ethnic diversity amongst the Palestinians.
Over the last 4000 years, the region has fallen under successive empires:
Alexander the Great, Rome, Persia, The Crusaders, The Mongols, the Egyptians, the Ottomans, etc.
All have left their genetic traces.
The Jewish/Israeli takeover of Palestine was not like the German invasion of France, or the Allied conquest of Germany. In those cases, the conquering power left the local populations in place.
An estimated 750,000 Palestinians fled from their homeland. Despite repeated UN resolutions, Israel has never let them return.
As I said, during the fighting when Israel was created, about 85% of the Palestinian population fled and became refugees. The new State of Israel has never allowed them to return.
So where are the Palestinians today? Estimates vary. Israeli sources tend to lowball, the Palestinian sources tend to do the opposite. According to Wikipedia there are between 11 and 20 million Palestinians in the world today. I have used the lower number of 11 million. I do not try to defend these numbers exactly. But they are pretty good approximations.
About 2.4 million live in the West Bank. On my first trip to the region I spent most of my time here – in Bethlehem, Hebron, Jericho, the Jordan Valley and East Jerusalem. This is where the fight is over the wall, the settlements, the house demolitions and so on that are so much in the news.
Another 1.6 million live in Gaza. I have never been there, but we do hear quite a bit about the difficult conditions for people in Gaza, especially after the Israeli attack on Gaza in 2009.
According to the UN, there are 4.7 million refugees. Of these about 1.2 million live in refugee camps in Gaza and the West bank, but the rest, about 3.5 million live in Lebanon, Jordan and Syria).
About 1.4 million Palestinians live inside Israel
Finally, there are approximately 2 million Palestinians in the diaspora. This number is the least clear. (e.g. Should a Palestinian who has lived in Canada for 20 years be counted or not??. Should a Palestinian who was in a refugee camp in Jordan, but who became a Jordanian citizen, be included, or not??) . I have taken the smallest number used by any independent sources.)
As I said, during the fighting when Israel was created, about 85% of the Palestinian population fled and became refugees. The new State of Israel has never allowed them to return.
So where are the Palestinians today? Estimates vary. Israeli sources tend to lowball, the Palestinian sources tend to do the opposite. According to Wikipedia there are between 11 and 20 million Palestinians in the world today. I have used the lower number of 11 million. I do not try to defend these numbers exactly. But they are pretty good approximations.
About 2.4 million live in the West Bank. On my first trip to the region I spent most of my time here – in Bethlehem, Hebron, Jericho, the Jordan Valley and East Jerusalem. This is where the fight is over the wall, the settlements, the house demolitions and so on that are so much in the news.
Another 1.6 million live in Gaza. I have never been there, but we do hear quite a bit about the difficult conditions for people in Gaza, especially after the Israeli attack on Gaza in 2009.
According to the UN, there are 4.7 million refugees. Of these about 1.2 million live in refugee camps in Gaza and the West bank, but the rest, about 3.5 million live in Lebanon, Jordan and Syria).
About 1.4 million Palestinians live inside Israel
Finally, there are approximately 2 million Palestinians in the diaspora. This number is the least clear. (e.g. Should a Palestinian who has lived in Canada for 20 years be counted or not??. Should a Palestinian who was in a refugee camp in Jordan, but who became a Jordanian citizen, be included, or not??) . I have taken the smallest number used by any independent sources.)
So what are their problems? Why are they complaining? What makes them angry?
All Palestinians are unhappy about what they call the “Nakba” (an arabic word which means ‘disaster’.)
What they mean by that was the disaster of 1948, when they lost their land, and their country.
But the dispersion of the Palestinians means that different groups have different problems.
The challenges the Palestinians have today in getting political unity, derives just as much from their differences in circumstance, as it does from religion or ideology.
Lets look at each group separately.
The Palestinians in the West Bank are the ones we hear most about. (its called the West Bank because its on the West Bank of the Jordan river. It is the kidney shaped highland – most of it is much higher and drier than the coastal area that became Israel.
After 1948, the West Bank was not part of Israel. Many Palestinians fled there and were protected by Jordan.
But in 1967, Israel took over the rest of historic Palestine – so the West Bank has been under israeli military occupation since then.
Practically, this means that the Palestinians who live there are under military law and human rights are very limited. No habeas corpus, for example. There are checkpoints everywhere – going anywhere becomes a challenge.
The “border” keeps moving as Israel keeps building more and more colonies for Jews only in the West Bank, there are now more than 500,000 Jewish settlers living in the WB. They come under Israeli law – not the military orders the Palestinians live under. And of course, the “wall” cuts them off from Jerusalem.
Gaza is the area we have been hearing about recently.
It is the home of Hamas, and also the source of the rockets that are fired into Israel from time to time.
Gaza was promised to the Palestinians by the UN in 1948, but Israel took it over in 1967.
2/3 of the people in Gaza are refugees – they fled Israel in 1948 and have been held there ever since.
Israel withdrew its troops (and a couple thousand settlers) from Gaza in 2004 at the same time it increased its construction in the WB
But Gaza remains blockaded – nobody allowed in or out, the economy is blocked.
In 2006, it elected Hamas, but the west refused to recognize it, and they remain stuck.
According to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), there are 4.7 million Palestinian refugees in 58 camps.
Some are not in camps
Their conditions vary from country to country. Arguably the worst in Lebanon
For the Palestinians the universal symbol is the “Key” that this woman is holding. Many families fled Palestine/Israel in 1948 with just clothes for a few days and the key to their house. They were never allowed to return.
Inside Israel there are 1.4 million “Israeli Arabs”, or “Palestinian Israelis”.
These are the people, and their descendents who did not flee in 1948. Some too old, sick, out of the way places, etc., many in Galilee
They mostly live in dozens of small towns scattered throughout Israel. Nazareth is biggest Palestinian city in israel. Population about 100,000
As israeli citizens – they have certain rights. The right to vote, for example and an Israeli passport. But as “non jews” in the Jewish State of Israel, there are lots of things they are not entitled to, and they face severe discrimination.
In the south, the Bedouins were forced into camps and put under martial law in 1948. Israel has nationalised all their lands. But they are carrying on a fight for lands
Here is the Israeli Arab town of Kefr Qasm. In 1949, it had a population of about 2000 people. It was a farming community and they farmed the land all around it.
Between 1949 and 1965 the Israeli parliament, which had a Jewish majority, voted some 20 laws relating to the ownership of land. Through these laws Israel “nationalized” almost all the land belonging to Palestinians in Israel.
KQ is now confined to the red square. On some of their confiscated land, Israel developed a new Jewish community called Rosh Ha’Ayin. 100% of the residents of KQ are Arab, 97% of the residents of RH are Jewish.
Today, about 93% of the land of Israel now belongs to the state or to another agency called the “Jewish National Fund”.
As a result, there is virtually no private ownership of land in Israel. You can’t go out and buy a plot of land like you can in Canada or the United States or France. Its kind of like “crown land” here in Canada.
As the owner of the land, the state can determine what to do with it.
So in 1955, the State of Israel created the Municipality of Rosh Ha’Ayin and attributed the land around KQ to the new municipality. It was to be a home for Jews arriving from Yemen.
As a result, of the confiscations, KQ now hemmed in on all sides. Look at where the Industrial Park is. It is legally a part of RH.
There is virtually no land in KQ for new houses or for new businesses to start up.
The southern half of Israel is the Negev
In 1948, when Israel was founded, there were no Jews living there, only Bedouins.
They had title to the land from the Ottoman period.
Israel has declared the whole territory “national area” and want to remove the Bedouin while creating new settlements for Jewish settlers.
The Bedouin are resisting.
Finally,
What about the Palestinians in the diaspora? What are their problems?
There are about 50,000 Palestinians in Canada. Many have never been allowed to return to their homes. Some have never seen Palestine. How is this possible? Many, like this Canadian Palestinian, were born in Kuwait, or Syria or Jordan of Palestinian parents who were refugees. They escaped refugee status one way or the other and eventualy came to Canada. But Israel will not allow them to return to Palestine. Even to see family members.
Actually, Palestinians are a lot like us. They are quite varied.
Here are a few of them.
The first pic is one of Shawki Abu Ghazaleh, the President of the Rotary Club of Ramallah exchanging flags with some Canadian rotary club members
Below them are 3 girls who are university students in Jenin, in the West Bank. They are talking to a Canadian woman – who was returning to Palestine after 40 years. She was born in Haifa, Palestine, and now returns to Haifa, Israel.
The kids – like any kids – are hamming to get their pics taken. They are in Israel. They speak Arabic, they are muslim, they are Palestinian, but they are citizens of Israel.
The man on the top right is Izzeldin Abuelaish a doctor. You may have heard of him. He is the man who lost his 3 daughters to Israeli missiles during the attack on Gaza in 2009. He now lives in Canada.
