PA prime minister Salam Fayyad, in his weekly radio address, spoke about the growing movement to give more rights to Arabs of Palestinian descent who are stuck in Lebanese "refugee" camps with few rights.
While he said that he supported giving them more civil rights, he stopped well short of asking that they should have the rights of other refugees worldwide - the right of citizenship in the country in which one is born. Instead, he called for UNRWA to continue to perpetuate the issue of being a caretaker for them, insisting that people who have been stateless for decades remain so until a complete solution is found for these "refugees," which he called "the core of the Palestinian issue."
He pointed out that the PLO is responsible for the political life and security in the camps, which helps explain why no Palestinian Arab leader is keen on actually helping these people/pawns and why no one is even beginning to talk about what would happen to millions of these people if a Palestinian Arab state is declared - for they certainly cannot all fit in the West Bank and Gaza.
Inevitably, they would have to become citizens of Arab countries, and there is no reason why those who choose to do so today cannot start the process.
Well, there is one reason: because the Arab leaders and the PA all agree that it is better to leave them as pawns rather than give them the basic right to choose what to do with their own lives. A lot of the loud complaints about Israel is a smokescreen to hide this 60 year Arab conspiracy to deny millions of people their basic rights.
