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The right of return is universally recognized under international law.
Article 13 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights states:
1. “Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state.
2. Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.”
Article 12 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) states:
“1. Everyone lawfully within the territory of a State shall, within that territory, have the right to liberty of movement and freedom to choose his residence.
2. Everyone shall be free to leave any country, including his own.
3. The above-mentioned rights shall not be subject to any restrictions except those which are provided by law, are necessary to protect national security, public order, public health or morals or the rights and freedoms of others, and are consistent with the other rights recognized in the present Covenant.
4. No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of the right to enter his own country.”
The UN Human Rights Committee is comprised of international experts involved in monitoring implementation of the ICCPR.
According to the body, “there are few, if any, circumstances in which deprivation of the right to enter one’s own country could be reasonable.”
Adopted near the end of Israel’s 1948 war, UN Resolution 194 resolved that Palestinian “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 equity, should be made good by the Governments or authorities responsible” – Article 11.
In May 1949, UN Resolution 273 granted Israel UN membership conditional on accepting and implementing UN Resolutions 181 (partitioning Mandatory Palestine into Jewish and Arab states) and 194, granting Palestinians their universally recognized right of return.
Throughout his tenure, Trump and his regime hardliners have been more contemptuous of fundamental Palestinians rights than his predecessors.
He clearly doesn’t give a damn about them, his actions leaving no ambiguity. He partners with Netanyahu regime high crimes – falsely blamed on Hamas and Palestinian resistance against apartheid viciousness.
He supports Jerusalem as Israel’s exclusive capital, what the world community rejects.
In January, after he took Jerusalem “off the table” in future peace talks, Israel’s Hadashot television news said the Netanyahu regime’s next goal is for the US to reject the fundamental right of return for millions of Palestinians.
Once announced, Trump will present his so-called “proposal for peace,” complying with Israeli demands – denying Palestinians their fundamental rights.
On Saturday, Hadashot news said Trump will formally reject the right of return for millions of Palestinian refugees.
In early September, his regime will announce a policy that “from its point of view” annuls this international law affirmed fundament right no nations have the right to deny.
The announcement will claim only around half a million Palestinian refugees exist, not five million, including their descendants.
The UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) defines a Palestinian refugee as “persons (including their patrilineal descendants) 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” – along with others affected the same way during Israel’s Six Day War of aggression.
Article 26 of the PLO’s Palestine National Covenant, the basis of all Palestinian law, states the struggle of its people is “to retrieve (their) homeland, liberate and return to it, and exercise the right to self-determination in it…”
Rights afforded under the UN Refugee Convention (1951) apply to descendants of refugees.
The Trump and Netanyahu regimes want UNWRA abolished, its humanitarian aid to millions of Palestinian refugees ended.
Their scheme is all about claiming these refugees don’t exist, wanting diaspora ones denied their international law affirmed right of return to their homeland.
According to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, the world body “recognizes descendants of refugees (worldwide) as refugees for purposes of their operations.”
Trump and Netanyahu regime hardliners want this notion abandoned. They want fundamental Palestinian rights denied.
They want refugee status for millions of Palestinians ended, making it easier to exploit them ruthlessly, wanting the notion of Palestine as their legitimate homeland erased.
That’s what the scourge of Zionist extremism is all about – denying indigenous Palestinians and their descendants their fundamental rights.
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Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago. He can be reached at [email protected].
His new book as editor and contributor is titled “Flashpoint in Ukraine: US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III.”
http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanIII.html
Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com.
