Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News: Palestinian refugees

Showing posts with label Palestinian refugees. Show all posts

Tuesday, May 31, 2022

Another Palestinian UNRWA freak-out

The Committee of the National and Islamic Forces in Gaza is holding an "emergency meeting" today because of a comment made last month by the Commissioner-General of UNRWA, Philippe Lazzarini, last month.

What was the terrible thing Lazzarini said?

He suggested that UNRWA outsource some of its functions to other UN agencies (that have consistent budgets.)

He pointed out the obvious fact that UNRWA's expenses can only go up as they keep adding new "refugees" to their rolls and never take any off, nor do they have a mechanism to take anyone off. Right now UNRWA goes begging for donations every few months because otherwise it would close down.

Palestinians went crazy, saying that this would be the first step towards UNRWA's dissolution. Why does that matter if they continue to get their services? Glad you asked:

UNRWA is “not just about the delivery of services,” said Muhammed Shehada from the Swiss-based Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor.

“As long as UNRWA is there, it’s a reminder that the international community has a responsibility to solve the issue of Palestinian refugees,” he told AFP.

UNRWA is just a symbol of keeping the Palestinian "refugee" issue alive forever, as opposed to every single other refugee issue in history.

The arguments that Palestinians are using against UNRWA allowing others to provide services are delusional. They say that this is a violation of UNGA Resolution 302 that created UNRWA to begin with, which they claim gives UNRWA exclusivity in providing services.

UNGA 302 (1950) says no such thing. In fact, it days the opposite!

18. Urges the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund, the International Refugee Organization, the World Health Organization, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization and other appropriate agencies and private groups and organizations, in consultation with the Director of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, to furnish assistance within the framework of the programme;

It also anticipates that UNRWA will only last a few years and that in the future the host countries would provide the same services UNRWA does. one of its two stated purposes in UNGA 302 is, "To consult with the interested Near Eastern Governments concerning measures to be taken by them preparatory to the time when international assistance for relief and works projects is no longer available."

As usual, the Palestinians are lying. UNRWA is not sacred and was never meant to be. It was meant to help the 1948 refugees until they were resettled and then disappear.

It isn't that asking other agencies for additional help violates UNGA 302. The very existence of UNRWA today, 42 years later, violates UNGA 302!

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Purim and natural hate

As I was reading the megillah this Purim, it occurred to me that the most resonant part of the story today is that Haman's hate for Jews was so irrational, although he pretended to justify it using weak arguments that people are more than willing to swallow to justify their own bigotry.

It is exactly the same today, as the Israel-haters are completely irrational. Their hate comes first, and their justifications come later. Answer their points and they will come up with others, because the entire basis of their antipathy to Jews is baseless, irrational hate.

The biggest lie they say is that they are "pro-Palestinian."

It just occurred to me that people who claim to be "pro-Palestinian" - like the entire staff at Electronic Intifada - are against any Palestinian being naturalized in any Arab country, and in fact they will say they are against Palestinians becoming citizens of any other country until they can "return" to destroy Israel. To these supposed lovers of all things Palestinian, they demand that millions of Arabs with Palestinian ancestry remain stateless, indefinitely.

What love they show!

But there is one recent exception where they fought mightily for a Palestinian to be a citizen of another country.

Terrorist Rasmea Odeh, as they fought hard to allow her to remain an American citizen. And even that they tried to justify on the basis of whatever crazy legal arguments they could find to hang their love for a murderer of Jews on.

Purim teaches us that the haters of Jews and Israel aren't ever going to go away. All we can do is win, over and over again.

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Iraq strips Palestinians of their rights. NGOs silent.

There are about 4000 Palestinians left in Iraq, a fraction of the number who used to live there.

From Al Monitor:

The Arabi21 news website revealed Dec. 20 that Iraqi President Fuad Masum had approved Law No. 76 of 2017, which stripped Palestinian refugees living in Iraq of their rights and classified them as foreigners. The law came into effect after being published in the Iraqi Gazette.

The new law replaced Law No. 202 of 2001, issued by former President Saddam Hussein, forcing the Iraqi state to treat Palestinians as equals to Iraqis, with all privileges and citizenship rights, such as tax exemption, opportunities to work in government departments, and access to education and health care services.

Mohammed Mshenesh, a Palestinian researcher on refugee affairs, told Al-Monitor, “The new law will deprive Palestinian engineers, doctors and teachers the ability to become members of Iraqi trade unions," thus preventing them from practicing these professions, "and whoever wants to start a commercial project will have to comply with the foreigners law, which requires the presence of an Iraqi sponsor and the approval of the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs and the Ministry of Interior. This will increase the Palestinians’ suffering and push the few left to leave Iraq.”

If the law were to be applied in early 2018, the number of Palestinians in Iraq would decrease even more; they would leave in search of safety, especially since they would be prevented from investing and deprived of employment in the private sector. The law would also prevent them from owning property or joining trade unions, and it would force them to pay full college tuition.

Thamer Mashineesh, the president of the Iraqi Palestinians Association, told Al-Monitor, “The Iraqi law ends the permanent residency of Palestinians in Iraq, so they are now required to renew their residency through consulting the official agencies. They could risk being expelled from Iraq if they were to commit any violation. This could threaten their rights to compulsory and university education, which evidently affects their education and gradually turns them into an ignorant community. In addition, all health care services would decline and they would be unable to pay for expensive surgeries, increasing their daily suffering.”

A law specifically targeting and discriminating against Palestinians.

In an Arab country.

Which has been mentioned in Arabic news media for nearly three weeks.

And this is the first English language article I've seen about it.

Somehow, the dozens of researchers at HRW and Amnesty, not to mention the "pro-Palestinian" NGOs who know Arabic. have not made a big deal out of this.

If they care so much about Palestinians, then why, oh why, do they ignore the news when their fellow Arabs are their oppressors?

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"Palestine:" The only "state" that wants its people to move to an enemy state

Qalandia "refugee" camp in the West Bank

From Times of Israel on Tuesday:

Responding to a reporter’s question on whether the US will continue to provide funding for the UN Relief and Works Agency, which provides aid to millions of Palestinian refugees, in light of a non-binding UN General Assembly resolution last month condemning the US recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, [Nikki] Haley said Trump was prepared to cut aid to UNRWA if the Palestinians refuse to return to peace talks.

“I think the president has basically said that he doesn’t want to give any additional funding until the Palestinians are agreeing to come back to the negotiation table,” Haley said. “We’re trying to move for a peace process but if that doesn’t happen the president is not going to continue to fund that situation.”

“The Palestinians now have to show their will — they want to come to the table. As of now they are not coming to the table but they ask for aid. We’re not giving the aid,” added Haley. “We’re going to make sure they come to the table and we want to move forward with the peace process.”

An article in Palestine Today says in Arabic what the Palestinians try not to say in English.

If UNRWA cannot get funded, then the "refugee" issue would fall to the UNHCR.

The UNHCR would not consider the vast majority of the people under UNRWA's mandate to be refugees.

As the article says, the entire point of UNRWA, from the Palestinian perspective, is to artificially keep the "refugee" issue alive - until the descendants of the refugees from 1948 are allowed to "return" to Israel.

Why would any self-respecting state, as the Palestinians consider themselves, want their own people to move to an enemy state? A state that they claim has an apartheid system against them, no less?

Absurdly, the demand for Arabs of Palestinian descent to move to Israel doesn't only apply to those who languish in "refugee" camps in Lebanon, Syria and Jordan, but also to every single resident of the camps in the West Bank and Gaza - under Palestinian control!

Nothing makes the goals of Palestinian nationalism as clear as their demands to perpetuate and fund the fake "refugee" status of their people until they can "return."

UNHCR tries to resettle refugees in other countries so they can rebuild their lives in peace and security. UNRWA wants to keep their "Palestine refugees" to be stateless until they "return" to Israel.

The goal is not to build a state for Palestinians but to destroy Israel. And it always has been.

Everyone knows that "return" is a demand to destroy Israel from the inside. But the international community won't say this out loud. The claim that Israel is somehow obligated to adhere to a tortured reading of a part of a single paragraph of a non-binding General Assembly resolution is still considered a cogent argument from the world that is still frightened of Arab terror. They pretend that the unique UNRWA definition of "refugee" has the same legal weight that the real definition of refugee has. (Not one European or even Arab country will accept asylum applications from UNRWA's "Palestine refugees" unless they are real refugees from Syria, for example.)

The entire UNRWA ecosystem has been subverted and repurposed since the 1950s with the single goal of destroying Israel - by keeping Palestinian Arabs in stateless misery - under the pretense of human rights.

The goals of Mahmoud Abbas' PA, of Fatah and Hamas, of the "pro-Palestinian" agitators, are all the same. And the "refugee" issue is all the proof you need.

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Why didn't anyone protest Michael Bolton for performing in Lebanon?

Michael Bolton performed in Lebanon on Wednesday night at the Jounieh Summer Festival.

Lebanon has literally passed laws to ensure that Palestinians can't own land, can't get many jobs, can't go to university and can't build even within their overcrowded camps.

Some two thirds of Lebanese Palestinians live under the poverty line.

Lebanon built a wall around one of those camps, complete with watchtowers. Lebanese police don't get involved as rival terror groups shoot at each other in these camps, often with fatal results both to each other and to residents there.

Lebanon had rejected the idea of granting citizenship to hundreds of thousands of Palestinians who have lived there for decades. Nor do their children have any rights.

Lebanon accepts hundreds of thousands of Syrian refugees - but turns back any who are Palestinian.

By any objective measure, Lebanon is a far worse place for Palestinians to live than the West Bank is.

Yet no one went on Bolton's Facebook page and demanded that he cancel the concert in solidarity with the Palestinians who are being oppressed, by law, every day in Lebanon.

Roger Waters didn't issue any public statements calling for Bolton to think about the situation of the Palestinians in Lebanon and show how much he cared by publicizing Lebanon's crimes.

No supposed "pro-Palestinian" group created any Twitter hashtags protesting Bolton's appearance or calling on everyone to boycott him because he decided to show such insensitivity to the Palestinian people.

Electronic Intifada didn't publish any articles about how awful it is that Lebanon can continue to repress its Palestinian population with impunity and artists aren't showing proper respect for them.

No "human rights activists" threatened to disrupt Bolton's future concerts because of his clear support for a government that is anti-Palestinian.

No one was offended that Bolton entered the stage carrying a Lebanese flag, a flag under which many Palestinians have been killed over the years and under which they are being discriminated against today..

Even though Palestinians are treated like garbage in Lebanon, artists like Bolton perform there every year without a peep of protest.

What possible reason is there that the "pro-Palestinian" crowd never organizes any actions against Lebanon?

I can only think of one reason.

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The 25th anniversary of the "naqba" you never hear about

25 years ago, in 1991, Kuwait expelled over 350,000 Palestinians.

And no one mentions this anniversary.

Many of the Palestinians in Kuwait had lived there for over a generation. Entire families were raised there.

But after the PLO embraced Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait, the Palestinian residents became targets. There were four fatal bomb attacks in Palestinian neighborhoods in late 1990. Kuwaiti forces

Here is a description of what happened 25 years ago in Kuwait:

The terror campaign after the war started as early as the arrival of the Kuwaiti forces on February 26, 1991. Kuwaiti militants were quoted saying that they would shoot suspected Palestinians when they found them in their apartments. Four main militia groups and two state institutions participated in a concerted effort to terrorize and persecute Palestinians in Kuwait. Two of the militias were headed by the state security officers Adel Al-Gallaf and Hussain Al-Dishti. The third was headed by Amin Al-Hindi, a gangster who specialized in rape, torture, stealing, and killing. The fourth was the group known as August 2nd, which specialized in psychological warfare against Palestinians. The army and the police forces represented the two state institutions that were involved in this terror campaign.[24]

Two Palestinians were shot dead near a traffic circle, on February 27.[25] On March 2, Kuwaiti tanks and soldiers rolled into Palestinian communities, mainly Hawalli. House-to-house searches for weapons and alleged collaborators resulted in the arrest of hundreds of Palestinians.[26] People were also arrested at checkpoints for no reason other than being Palestinians. Typically, they were beaten instantly then taken to police and detention centers where they were tortured for confessions.

Despite the military censorship, newspapers began to report a dramatic rise in the number of injured Palestinians in Mubarak Hospital.[27] Scores of people were treated from severe beating and torture. Six Palestinians were brought to the Hospital shot dead in the head, execution style.[28] By the third week of March, hundreds of people were treated from torture injuries and thousands stayed in detention centers for interrogation.[29] Amnesty International reported that the torture of Palestinians was continuing in Kuwait by the third week of April. A 24-year-old Palestinian had been beaten for hours, had acid thrown over him, and had been subjected to electric shock torture.[30]

The terror campaign continued throughout 1991 achieving its main objective: terrorizing Palestinians enough so that they would leave the country. To expedite the process, the government took several other measures to evict those who did not leave. First, Palestinians working for the government were fired or not rehired. Second, Palestinian children were kicked out of public schools and subsidies for their education in private schools were stopped. Third, new fees became required for health services. Fourth, housing rents increased and people were asked by Kuwaiti landlords to pay rent for the entire crisis-period.[31]

More important were the feelings of injustice and insecurity Palestinians began to experience as a result of the terror campaign. It became unsafe to walk in streets or to stay at home. Rape stories functioned as a decisive pushing factor for the remaining Palestinian families. The "censored" Western media rarely reported on this part of the campaign. The CNN TV network covered one of these rape stories. Lubbadah[32] told the same story together with many others. The Middle East Watch group also told several stories of rape.[33]

On May 27, 1991, several members of a Kuwaiti militia group entered the apartment of a newly married Palestinian couple. They divided themselves into two groups. One group took the twenty-six year old bride, Najah Yusuf As'ad, to one room where they raped her one after the other then they shot her with nine bullets in the head. The other group took the thirty-year old groom, Muhammed Musa Mahmood Mustafa, to another room where they also raped him one after the other then they shot him with four bullets in his spine. When they finished committing their crimes, they sat in the apartment, drank tea, then called the bride's family several times telling them what happened to their daughter. Another story was about A.M.M., an eighteen-year old Palestinian girl. She was kidnapped and gang-raped for two days then was brought to Mubarak Hospital on May 25, 1991. Her family said that she was kidnapped in front of her house by Kuwaiti young men. A third story was about S.M.A.D., a twelve-year old Palestinian girl, who was also kidnapped in front of her house in Al-Rumaithiyah, on June 6, 1991. She was also gang-raped for two days by a group of Kuwaitis. A fourth story was about F.M.A.F, a fifteen-years old Palestinian girl, who was kidnapped in front of her house in Al-Farwaniyah, on June 4, 1991. She was raped for two days then was brought to Al-Adan Hospital. Finally, a Palestinian woman in her fifties was kidnapped and raped by a group of Kuwaiti men about the same age. A Kuwaiti man approached her offering help. He gave her an address where she can receive social assistance. When she went to the address, she was kidnapped and raped for a week by several Kuwaiti men who then left her in a deserted area.[34]

The government also intensified its efforts to evict the remaining Palestinians directly through deportation. Between the middle of June and the first week of July 1991, about 10,000 Palestinians were deported to the Iraqi border.[35] On July 8, the Minister of Interior Affairs, Ahmed Hamoud Al-Jaber Al-Sabah, announced that there were about 1,000 more Palestinians in detention camps waiting for deportation.[36] Actually, these deportations forced tens of thousands of other Palestinians to leave, mainly family members, because they could not practically stay when the head of the household or the main bread winner was deported.

The deportees were dumped at the Iraqi border near Safwan. Gradually, it became known as the Safwan Refugee Camp. Many of the deportees to this camp were tortured and brutally beaten by Kuwaiti troops. In most cases people were simply "dumped" there without any legal deportation procedures.[37] Typically, people were arrested at checkpoints, then beaten and tortured to admit that they were collaborators. If they did not admit, they would be deported to Safwan Camp.[38] One of the Camp deportees was Fayiz Nadir, a 23-year-old Palestinian. He was burned 10 times with an iron on his arms, feet, and head. Another one was Abdul Qadir, a 30-year-old Algerian. He was arrested together with Fayiz Nadir for two weeks. He saw 109 men in the detention center with their hands tied behind their backs, often blindfolded. When the men were brought to the interrogation, they were kicked and jabbed with gun butts. Electrical wires were put on their fingers and temples. They were given water twice a day and food once every four days.[39] A Sudanese truck driver, Mustafa Hamzah, was arrested and blindfolded for two weeks in the Salmiya Girls' Secondary School. He named the Kuwaiti 1st Lt. Abdul Latif Al-Anzi as the person who was in charge of that detention center. A Palestinian deportee told the New York Human Rights Group that he was tortured in that school. They burned him with a cattle brand, beat him, then dumped him by a roadside.[40]

Torture, assassinations, rape, and the planned and public ethnic cleansing of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from their homes.

Why aren't Palestinians marking this anniversary? Why isn't any "pro-Palestinian" group talking about this "naqba?"

You know why. The entire reason people pretend to be "pro-Palestinian" has nothing to do with their love for Palestinians but because of their hate for another group.

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Islamic State declares control of Yarmouk camp, "pro-Palestinians" silent

Yesterday, the Islamic State declared that it had seized control of the Palestinian Arab "refugee" camp in Yarmouk, Syria.

While you will sometimes see the "pro-Palestinian" crowd say how terrible things are in Yarmouk, the amount of attention given to it by them - and as a result, by the media - is tiny compared to how they report anything Israel does.

The Action Group for Palestinians in Syria reports that five people of Palestinian origin have been killed in Yarmouk this month, and 1,247 have been killed in the camp alone so far during Syria's civil war.

Yarmouk is yet more proof that most groups that claim to be "pro-Palestinian" are simply anti-Israel - and don't give a damn about Palestinians who are truly suffering anywhere else.

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Everyone hates Palestinian Arabs when there are no Jews around

An eye-opening report from the UN's IRIN news site, May 25:

Until November, it is alleged that Jordan routinely deported Syrian refugees who had broken the law back to Syria... Most Syrians are now sent to the Azraq refugee camp in Jordan instead. However, this is not the case for Palestinians, whose deportations do not appear to have been halted.

Jordan has denied entrance to Palestinian refugees living in Syria since January 2013, although this had already been the unofficial policy for months prior to the official announcement.

“They should stay in Syria until the end of the crisis,” Jordan’s Prime Minister Abdullah Ensour said in an interview at the time with the pan-Arab daily newspaper al-Hayat.

Many people fleeing Syria’s civil war have, however, been smuggled across the border, and Palestinians found to have entered the country illegally have been detained and are often deported back to Syria.

At least 42 Palestinians from Syria have been forcibly deported this year, in addition to 117 in 2014, according to sources familiar with the cases. Rights groups say those deported are at high risk of being arrested and tortured.

Here is the full quote from Jordan's Prime Minister:

Al-Hayat: But why are you preventing the Palestinian refugees fleeing from Syria from entering the kingdom, while knowing that they have Syrian travel documents?

Ensour: There are those who want to exempt Israel from the repercussions of displacing the Palestinians from their homes. Jordan is not a place to solve Israel’s problems. Jordan has made a clear and explicit sovereign decision to not allow the crossing to Jordan by our Palestinian brothers who hold Syrian documents. Receiving those brothers is a red line because that would be a prelude to another wave of displacement, which is what the Israeli government wants. Our Palestinian brothers in Syria have the right to go back to their country of origin. They should stay in Syria until the end of the crisis.

If we save their lives, we'd be doing what Israel wants us to do! Better to let them rot!

This is reminiscent of Mahmoud Abbas' own words saying that it is better for Palestinians to die in Syria rather than give up the mythical "right to return" to Israel.

The IRIN article shows that it is not only Jordan that turns its back on Syrian residents with Palestinian ancestry:

Palestinians from Syria are not allowed to register with the UN’s refugee agency, UNHCR, to receive aid, and many say they cannot contact other NGOs for fear of being discovered and stripped of their citizenship and deported. Many aid agencies will not work with them or represent them, making them particularly vulnerable to exploitation in the informal labour market.

Other Middle Eastern countries, including Lebanon, have also effectively banned Palestinians from Syria from entering.

There are literally hundred of NGOs operating in Israel and the territories, mostly funded by Europe, that are "pro-Palestinian." Yet almost none of these supposedly "pro-Palestinian" agencies take the slightest interest in the plight of Palestinians whose suffering cannot be blamed on Jews.

Now, why would that be?

(h/t Irene)

Statistics on Palestinians in Syria that "pro-Palestinian" groups won't mention

Here are some statistics that most "pro-Palestinian" groups won't bother to mention, from the Action Group of Palestinians in Syria's Facebook page:

At least 45 Palestinians were recently tortured to death, the number who have been tortured to death in Syrian prisons is now at 333.

Jordan had as many as 15,000 Palestinian refugees from Syria but that number has declined to a little over 10,000; many of them had been deported back to the country that they were fleeing. Many of the refugees go to Jordan pretending to be native Syrians so they won't be treated as badly as Jordan treats Palestinians.

At least 27,933 Syrian Palestinians have managed to sneak into Europe since the war started. I don't have the numbers of the scores who have drowned trying to reach Europe.

51,000 are in Lebanon and 6,000 in Egypt, where they are also in danger of being detained and deported.

172 have died so far from the siege of the Yarmouk camp in Syria, where there is no water or electricity.

ISM? Silent.

Free Gaza? Silent.

SJP? Silent.

Fatah's homepage? Silent.

Abbas sentenced hundreds of Syrian Palestinians to death in 2013 (poster)

Ma'an reports on a brand new Palestinian Arab lie:

Fatah central committee member Mohammad Ishtayyeh said on Thursday that the Palestinian Authority had attempted to negotiate the return of Palestinian refugees from Syria, but Israel had refused.

Ishtayyeh said in a meeting with diplomats organized by the Heinrich Böll Foundation in Ramallah that the PA had tried with all its might to "end the suffering" of Palestinians in Syria through international mediation.

Israeli officials, however, had refused to allow them to come to the Palestinian territories.

What really happened, from AP, January 10, 2013:

The Palestinian president said he has rejected a conditional Israeli offer to let Palestinian refugees in war-torn Syria resettle in the West Bank and Gaza, charging it would compromise their claims to return to lost homes in Israel.

Abbas said he asked U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon last month to seek Israeli permission to bring Palestinians caught in Syria's civil war to the Palestinian territories. The request came after fighting between Syrian troops and rebel fighters in Yarmouk, the largest Palestinian refugee camp in Syria. About half of the camp's 150,000 residents have fled, according to a U.N. aid agency.

Abbas told a group of Egyptian journalists in Cairo late Wednesday that Ban contacted Israel on his behalf.

Abbas said Ban was told Israel "agreed to the return of those refugees to Gaza and the West Bank, but on condition that each refugee ... sign a statement that he doesn't have the right of return (to Israel)."

"So we rejected that and said it's better they die in Syria than give up their right of return," Abbas told the group. Some of his comments were published Thursday by the Palestinian news website Sama.

Hundreds of Syrian Palestinians have died since then. And it is all because Abbas didn't even give them the choice to live. His "principles" are more important than their lives.

Even as Palestinian Arabs continue to die in Syria, no one is pressuring Abbas to reverse his death sentence. The UN is silent. NGO's are silent. World leaders continue to treat Abbas with respect. Newspaper editorials gush how "moderate" he is.

And Syrian Palestinians continue to die, every day, directly because of a decision Abbas made more than a year ago.

Every single "pro-Palestinian" activist should be asked in every venue they speak if they agree with Abbas. Amnesty International and Oxfam and Human Rights Watch should be asked whether they agree that Syrian Arabs are better off dead than given the even the choice to live.

The Heinrich Boll Foundation, which heard this new Palestinian Arab slander against Israel, should be told the truth.

Shouldn't everyone?

Lebanon treating Palestinian Syrians like dirt, no one cares

From IPS:

Over the past year more than 50,000 Palestinian refugees have fled violence, chaos and destitution in Syria to seek sanctuary in Lebanon. The vast majority have found themselves living in dire poverty, and trapped in chronically insecure existence.

Denied assurances of legal residence many are unsure if and how they can continue to live in the country into the New Year.

"Who, I mean really who from the Palestinian families can pay 200 dollars for the papers for every family member? If the average family is five people, then that is 1,000 dollars. This is impossible as we know most Palestinian refugees are't even sure how they are going to feed their children one day to the next," Mahmoud Assir Saawi, president of the Council for Palestinian Refugees Fleeing from Syria told IPS.

Such sentiments are reiterated time and time again within the squalid camps and overcrowded ghettoes throughout Lebanon. Palestinians arriving from Syria find themselves in an administrative and bureaucratic morass hobbled by decades of troubled history and war that offers them scant security.

The presence of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians in Lebanon has always been a highly divisive issue, with many Lebanese blaming Palestinians for the role they played in the nation's rancorous civil war from 1975 to 1990. The arrival of large communities of their compatriots this past year has further exacerbated existing fears and prejudices.

It is perhaps for this reason that the arriving Palestinians have been classified as "guests", "migrants" or "displaced people". To afford them the more apt title of "refugee" would bring with it legal obligations, most notably under the Geneva convention, which Lebanon would struggle to realise.

Fears of Palestinian, and even Syrian refugees settling in Lebanon permanently, and thus shifting the precarious sectarian balance within the country, are common and are regularly aired in the media and by politicians. As such the refugees' status remains vulnerable and their sanctuary insecure.

Securing residency papers remains one of the biggest problems for Palestinian refugees from Syria. Upon arrival Palestinians fleeing war and hunger are only granted a one-week visa in Lebanon, which then must then extend.

Palestinian journalist Maher Ayoub from Yarmouk Camp in Damascus knows first hand about the vulnerability of life in Lebanon. On a recent trip to renew his papers he was ordered to leave the country within the week, despite assurances from the Lebanese government that it would not throw out any refugees.

Faced with incarceration in Lebanon or a perilous return to Syria, he has taken refuge in one of the Palestinian camps Lebanese security services are not allowed to enter under an agreement reached at the end of the civil war.

"Where can I go? What can I do? I have no options now," Ayoub told IPS.

Many other Palestinian refugees distrustful of the security services or fearful of being unable to pay their annual visa renewal fees are seeking cover within the camps. The reality is a life of incarceration in chronically overcrowded hovels of destitution where unemployment is rife.

"We know they are our brethren and we must help them but this is becoming untenable," said Abu Ahmad, a Lebanese-Palestinian resident from Chatilla camp. "I used to get at least a week's work every month but now there is nothing. Every day we are seeing problems in the camp because of the desperation and the lack of work. People are even starting to pull weapons on each other. We need more support."

Has anyone condemned Lebanon for its policy of treating Palestinians from Syria worse than other Syrian refugees?

Has anyone condemned Lebanon for forcing the Palestinians to return to a war zone?

Has anyone condemned Lebanon for effectively imprisoning them in overcrowded camps that they cannot leave without fear of expulsion?

Nope, this story - like the story of Palestinians in Syria literally starving to death - is all but ignored by the people who love to condemn Israel for the smallest perceived offenses.

When you hear someone say they are "pro-Palestinian," ask them exactly what they are doing for the Palestinian Arabs being oppressed in Lebanon, Syria, Egypt and Jordan. Where are their flotillas, their convoys, their art exhibits, their press releases, their letters to the editor, their church stunts?

Their silence explains exactly how "pro-Palestinian" they really are.

The siege on Palestinian Arabs that the world ignores

The Lebanon Daily Star reported last month:

BEIRUT: Residents and fighters fear they may be starved out of the Damascus suburb of Yarmouk as the siege of the Palestinian area approaches its fifth month, mirroring the increasingly desperate humanitarian situation in many of the capital’s suburbs. The relatively new practice of blockading neighborhoods reflects a shifting strategy among rebel and government forces, analysts say, as both sides hunker down for what is expected to be a long war of attrition.

Yarmouk was originally a camp for Syria’s Palestinian refugees but has since expanded into a sprawling neighborhood in Damascus’ rebel-held southern belt. It has been encircled by troops loyal to President Bashar Assad since February.

On the second day of Ramadan, July 10, government forces tightened their grip on the area and sealed off a checkpoint that was the area’s only gateway to the capital, which was previously only sporadically open to allow through aid and fleeing residents.

The movement of food, medicine and people came to a complete halt.

“Civilians are totally forbidden from going out of the camp. At the same time, no food is coming in. They [the soldiers] have refused to let in vaccines for polio, measles, chickenpox and flu,” said Abdullah, an activist who has been stuck inside the neighborhood for over a year.

That siege is now 139 days old.

While the world constantly hears about a "siege" on Gaza where there are no restrictions by Israel on fuel, medicine,food or hundreds of other items,and where hundreds of people enter and leave every week, no one is talking about the real siege of tens of thousands of people in Yarmouk which is now on day 139.

Similarly, the death toll of Palestinians in Syria has now reached 1781, the vast majority of whom are civilians. But there is no Goldstone Report about this. No UN resolutions about Palestinians in Syria. No special sessions of the Security Council, nothing at the UN Human Rights Council, and very little in the media. No political Christmas carols being sung outside Syrian embassies.

I'm sure there is a rational explanation for why the "pro-Palestinian" crowd is exerting so much little effort on helping Palestinians literally starving to death.

And it probably has to do with the fact that they aren't "pro-Palestinian" at all.

(h/t Yerushalimey on caroling)

PFLP-GC claims 23,000 Syrian Palestinians have fled to Sweden

The PFLP-GC claims that some 23,000 Palestinian Arabs from the Yarmouk camp in Syria have fled to Sweden during the civil war.

Yarmouk camp

The group, which supports the Syrian regime, blames the opposition for setting up their forces in the camp.

I couldn't find verification of the numbers, but they are not unrealistic. In 2012 there were over 2000 Palestinian Arabs along with some 8000 Syrians who sought asylum in Sweden, and things have gotten far worse this year.

There is of course one additional factor: Arab nations have been treating the Palestinian Arab refugees from Syria like garbage, either turning them back at the border (Jordan, Egypt) or putting inhuman restrictions on them (Lebanon.) (I have been unable to determine if Iraq is letting any Palestinian Arab refugees into its camps.)

Oil-rich Gulf countries don't want any of them, either.

It is not surprising that the ones that make it successfully to Sweden will communicate with their relatives and friends and tell them that Europe is far more friendly to Palestinians than their Arab brothers are.

For some reason, "pro-Palestinian" groups are silent as to how their pets are being treated by Arab countries. No rallies, flotillas, or other campaigns against Jordan, Egypt, and Lebanon. And the last time there was a Palestinian Arab refugee crisis - when they were expelled from Iraq by the thousands - Arab leaders were dead-set against them becoming naturalized in the West, because happy European Palestinian Arabs are no longer useful as cannon fodder against Israel.

It is remarkable how much the very people who pretend to love the Palestinian Arabs the most are the ones who care about them the least. Even more remarkable is that the Western media and "human rights" organizations all but ignore the discrimination and hate by Arabs for their own.

PalArab death toll in Syria: 1597. Plus, reports Syria now using fuel-air bombs.

According to the Action Group of Palestinians of Syria, the number of Palestinian Arabs killed in Syria so far is 1597.

Eight were killed last week.

Here is a video from yesterday of the aftermath of an airstrike at the Yarmouk camp, where most Palestinian Syrians live.

So called "pro-Palestinian" groups are about as silent as they usually are. Instead, they are protesting outside Israeli stores in England and Australia. An Israeli company selling environmentally friendly products is clearly a bigger threat to world peace than Syrians directly bombing civilians to these oh-so-moral anti-Israel protesters.

Meanwhile, now that Syria is saying they won't use chemical weapons any more, the world doesn't have to be concerned over this new weapon, according to HRW:

A Syrian government airstrike using fuel-air explosive bombs hit outside a secondary school in the opposition-held city of Raqqa on September 29, 2013, killing at least 14 civilians. At least 12 of those killed were students attending their first day of classes.

A Raqqa resident who went to the school immediately after the attack told Human Rights Watch that he saw 14 bodies, including some without limbs. A doctor from National Hospital in Raqqa said he saw 12 dead bodies, most of them students, and the hospital treated 25 wounded.

The blast wounds and flash burns visible on victims in videos and photographs, coupled with the body positions and few shrapnel wounds, indicates the use of fuel-air explosives (FAE), also known as “vacuum bombs,” Human Rights Watch said. More powerful than conventional high-explosive munitions of comparable size, fuel-air explosivesinflict extensive damage over a wide area, and are therefore prone to indiscriminate impact in populated areas.

Jordan treats Palestinian Syrian refugees "worse than dogs"

From Amnesty:

Cyber City is an unusual camp beside a desolate crossroads outside Irbid, in northern Jordan. Hidden behind a wall and some pine trees, a dreary six-floor block looks out over rusting machinery and a dry plain. Formerly for migrant workers, it now hosts around 500 refugees from Syria.

After passing security checks I bump into Abu Alaa, a dignified 60-year-old refugee whose two sons are missing in Syria. “No news still,” he sighs, holding my hand warmly. “I was just calling again.” His phone shows repeated unanswered calls to numbers back home. He says his two grown-up sons had tried following him into Jordan but were refused entry due to their Palestinian origin. On separate occasions over the coming months, each appears to have been detained by the Syrian security forces and Abu Alaa fears they may not be alive.

Palestinians have been heavily affected by the violence in Syria. Almost half of the 500,000 or so Palestinian refugees in Syria have been displaced. Refugee camps and other areas in which they live, including Dera’a Camp, and Yarmouk and Sayida Zaynab in Damascus, have witnessed heavy fighting. Some 6,000 residents were forced out of Ein al-Tal Camp in Aleppo in April 2013. Sbeineh Camp in Damascus was reportedly hit by a ground-to-ground missile in May 2013, killing at least five people. Two children and two women were among at least five others killed by mortar shells fired into Khan Eshieh Camp near Damascus in June 2013.

Yet Abu Alaa’s sons are among hundreds if not thousands of Palestinian refugees fleeing the violence in Syria who are believed to have been turned away at the Jordanian border, in violation of international law. While Jordan is hosting around half a million people from Syria, it is generally not allowing access to Palestinian or Iraqi refugees...

Of some 7,000 or more Palestinians who did manage to enter Jordan, either before the country denied all access to them early last year or as a result of using false documents, some were later forced back to the border, also in violation of international law.

Bilal, who entered Jordan ahead of other family members, tells me his father and brothers were detained in Amman and escorted to the border in December 2012. “One night my elder brother rang and told me they had been taken there at gunpoint. My younger brother had been pulled by his hair and forced into the security vehicle that took them there. They waited three days just 100 metres beyond the Jordan border post, with fighting nearby, hoping to be allowed back, until my elder brother was injured and they realized the only option was to seek aid inside Syria.”

A worse fate befell Mahmud Merjan, who Cyber City residents say was killed on a Syrian street in late 2012, three weeks after being forced to sign a “voluntary” paper that he would go back to Syria. “It wasn’t an arbitrary killing,” says one man who knew him well. “He was known and wanted by the regime.”

All those in Cyber City have fled from Syria. But while the Palestinians from Syria used to be the majority, I am told, their numbers have dwindled as many got fed up with conditions and returned to the conflict zone. “I prefer to go back and die in Syria with some dignity rather than live without it here,” many say.

Complaints about the conditions here are many. Palestinians are not officially permitted to leave Cyber City. Now and again informal permission is granted to visit relatives in Irbid and Amman and so on, but mostly they are confined to the building and the immediate vicinity. Such conditions amount to arbitrary detention. “I’m sorry, but a dog can come and go more easily than we can,” says a very frustrated Ali, who has been here for more than a year.

The closed border to Palestinians and the arbitrary detention of Palestinians is further dividing families, whose identities reflect decades of turmoil and flight. Sena, a Syrian woman, is here with her children while her Palestinian husband is unable to enter Jordan. Ziad is in Cyber City while his Syrian wife and children are in a Jordanian town. Elderly Abu Khaled has to stay here while family members holding Jordanian nationality do not.

While Syrians and Palestinians from Syria appreciate being in safety in Jordan, they struggle to make ends meet. Individuals are entitled to a monthly coupon worth 24 Jordanian dinars (about US$34) which they exchange for food in a small shop next to Cyber City. This works out as a mere 0.80 dinars per day, it is repeatedly pointed out. A 160g tin of tuna on the shop’s shelves costs more than that.

“It is 100 per cent worse for Palestinians here than for the Syrians,” says Ziad. “One, they are allowed to leave this place while we are not and, two, when they go out they can visit charitable organizations, show their UN refugee agency card” – which Palestinians do not have as they fall under the mandate of [the UN Relief and Works Agency] instead, although they should receive the same services – “and collect further relief.”

“Every day here is the same,” Bilal continues. “Eat, sleep, eat, sleep.” With others, he counts off the names of families who have decided to risk their lives to go back into Syria. “Yes, this is what the Jordanian government wants, for us to go back. But what is the alternative? We live without purpose here. This is not life.”

A friend of the deceased Mahmud Merjan summed up the despair: “It was one of our life’s dreams to visit Jordan, but we came and encountered such hate. Let’s hope there are no more refugee camps for Palestinians in heaven.”

Even Lebanon, which has anti-Palestinian laws and severe restrictions on what Palestinians are allowed to do, allows refugees from Syria of Palestinian ancestry to go to overcrowded UNRWA camps there to get services. Jordan isn't even allowing that, preferring to send them to their possible deaths in Syria.

Here we have systemic and institutionalized discrimination against Palestinians by their fellow Arabs, far worse than anything Israel does, and the world media is silent. I cannot find a single English language media outlet to report this story from Amnesty even though it was published on Monday.

Just yesterday, five more Palestinians in Syria were killed, including two children. The media silence is deafening.

Similarly, so-called "pro-Palestinian" groups say nothing.

The reason is because so-called "pro-Palestinian activists" who are brilliant at getting press coverage for anti-Israel stunts don't really give a damn about real Palestinians - when their suffering cannot be blamed on Israel. The media similarly doesn't consider Arab hate for Palestinians to be newsworthy.

The double standards applied to Israel are crystal clear.

Lebanese apartheid: More than half of Palestinians in Lebanon live in poverty

From Ma'an:

Around 160,000 Palestinians are living below the poverty line in refugee camps in Lebanon, the ambassador to Beirut says.

Nearly 13,000 Palestinian refugees are living in extreme poverty in Lebanon, Ashraf Dabour told Ma'an.

Palestinian refugees are banned from entering 75 professions in Lebanon. "Practicing any of these careers is considered a breach of Lebanese law," Dabour said.

The Lebanese parliament amended a law restricting Palestinian refugees' access to work. "However, the Lebanese cabinet has not put that amendment into effect," the Palestinian ambassador said.

"We hear sweet talk from Lebanese officials about the Palestinian refugees' right to work and live in dignity, but in reality nothing is translated into action."

Dabour said the Palestinian health sector in Lebanon owed hospitals around $2 million. "There are some medical procedures which our health security program in Lebanon can't afford, and I hereby urge Arab and Palestinian businessmen to help our people in refugee camps in Lebanon."

There were, at the end of 2010, between 260,000 and 280,000 Palestinian Arabs in Lebanon (UNRWA has over 465,000 registered "refugees" but about 200,000 actually left Lebanon for Europe and elsewhere.)

Which means that more than half of the Palestinians in Lebanon are in poverty, because of the discrimination they face by the Lebanese government.

Not that this is new news. Two years ago UNRWA came out with a report with more specifics about Palestinian poverty in Lebanon, and it mentioned that one reason was that many were forced to live in "closed" camps that were not integrated into the economy of surrounding towns, and that in itself was an indicator of likely poverty. Only one other area had that same problem - the West Bank, under the PA.

Since then, Palestinian Arab refugees from Syria have come into Lebanon, and been forced into these same overcrowded and poverty-stricken camps, unlike other refugees from Syria.

Yet this blatant discrimination against Palestinian Arabs in Lebanon is simply not mentioned by those who pretend to care about them. No calls for boycotts by rock stars, no campus demonstrations, no calls for aid.

When their suffering cannot be blamed, even indirectly, on Israel, no one really gives a damn.

The next time you see a "pro-Palestinian" demonstration, just ask them about discrimination against Palestinians in Lebanon. And put it on video.

Palestinian death toll in Syria rises above 1000

From the beginning of the Syrian uprising until the end of February, 1036 Palestinian Arabs have been killed, according to the "Working Group of Syrian Palestinians."

Since then, it appears that several more are being killed every day:

4 on March 2
5 on March 5
12 on March 6
5 on March 9
8 on March 10

You must have seen the news coverage of the many "pro-Palestinian" demonstrations outside world embassies protesting these deaths every day, right?

Here's a video that claims to be of a Palestinian Syrian woman in front of her sister's husband's body who was hung for allegedly being a "spy" for the government.

Jordan tells Syrian Palestinians to drop dead. No one cares.

From Times of Israel earlier this week:

Jordan has turned away dozens of Palestinian refugees on the Syrian border fleeing regime bombardment of the Yarmouk refugee camp south of Damascus.

Palestinian refugees living in the Yarmouk refugee camp south of Damascus have tried to enter Jordan through the Jaber border crossing after their camp was bombarded by Assad regime forces in previous weeks. They told Al-Jazeera earlier this week that while Palestinian refugees carrying Jordanian IDs were allowed to enter Jordan, children of Jordanian women who were not citizens are being refused.

Jordan has absorbed some 126,000 Syrian refugees, but Palestinians fleeing Syria are placed in a separate refugee camp at the Cyber City compound, under stricter conditions, and are banned from entering Jordanian cities. The Jordanian government fears that an influx of Palestinian refugees may tilt the demographic balance in Jordan even more towards the Palestinians, who are already believed to comprise a large majority of the population.

“Jordan is not obligated to pay a political price for the Syrian crisis,” Jordanian government spokesman Samih Maaytah told Al-Jazeera when asked why the Palestinians were not being let in.

25 PalArabs killed in Syrian mosque airstrike. "Pro-Palestinian" groups silent.

From France24:

Syrian fighter jets bombed the Palestinian Yarmouk camp in Damascus on Sunday, killing at least 25 people sheltering in a mosque in an area where Syrian rebels have been trying to advance into the capital, opposition activists said.

The attack was part of a month-long campaign by President Bashar al-Assad’s forces to eject rebels fighting to overthrow him from positions hemming in Damascus. It came a day after warplanes bombed rebels on the road to Damascus international airport.

A video posted on YouTube showed bodies and body parts scattered on the stairs of what appeared to be the mosque.

Here's the video (GRAPHIC):

Somehow, Electronic Intifada hasn't covered this story yet although it is six hours old. Neither has Free Gaza.

Dead Syrians of Palestinian origin aren't really worth getting too upset over if Israel can't be blamed.

500 dead - and hypocritical "pro-Palestinian activists" are silent

You know how all the Israel-haters pretend to be "pro-Palestinian"?

Here's more proof that they are anything but.

It appears that as of today, more than 500 Palestinian Arabs have been murdered in Syria by Bashir Assad's regime.

(Calculation: 482 documented on October 7, 8 killed last Friday, 12 killed today.)

Have any of the supposedly "pro-Palestinian" groups, like "Ship to Gaza" or "Miles of Smiles," said anything about this?

Have there been any press releases from passionate advocates of the "Palestinian cause" about "genocide" being perpetrated by the Syrian regime?

Have you read any articles written by them about how terribly Syria is treating Palestinian Arabs?

No, of course not. No fundraising, no speeches, no tours of college campuses, no flotillas, no op-eds - nothing.

Here's another interesting proof of Arab hatred for their Palestinian brothers that "pro-Palestinian activists" completely ignored, buried at the end of an AP article yesterday:

The U.N. refugee agency said Thursday the number of Syrian refugees who have fled their country's civil war and found shelter in Egypt has now topped 150,000 — a significant jump from last month's figure of 95,000.

The director of UNHCR in Egypt, Mohamed Dayri, said that despite the growing number of refugees in Egypt, only 4,800 Syrians have registered with the agency in Cairo. He called on Egyptian authorities to help UNHCR deal with the "rising emergency" of Syrian refugees here.

...[Dayri] said that the U.N. is urging Egypt to maintain an "open door policy" not only for Syrians, but also for Palestinian refugees in Syria who also are fleeing the civil war.

"The Palestinian refugees should be treated equally like Syrians who are fleeing violence and insecurity," Dayri said.

It doesn't take much reading between the lines to see that Egypt is not treating Palestinian Syrian refugees as they are treating the rest; it is possible that Egypt is not even allowing any of them to enter Egypt.

And it is not only Egypt. Other countries are singling them out too:

Syria's roughly 500,000 Palestinians "have been been thrust into the crisis since June and July," Radhouane Nouicer, the UN Regional Humanitarian Coordinator for Syria, said at a Cairo press conference.

"Many of them have been displaced like Syrians and we are trying to encourage neighbouring countries to adopt an open door policy with them, like Syrians," he said, adding that he hoped Palestinians would not be forced out of Syria.

He is apparently referring to Jordan and Lebanon, although probably those fleeing to Iraq are having similar issues.

UNHCR knows this, and of course the Palestinian Arabs who tried to flee to Egypt know this, but I have not seen a single article anywhere that discusses the extent of Egypt's discrimination against Palestinians.

In the end, the "pro-Palestinian activists" don't give a damn about their Palestinians. Like the Arab leaders for the past 65 years, they only want to use them as pawns to destroy Israel.

And their silence when hundreds of Palestinians are killed and tens of thousands singled out by their Arab hosts is all the proof you need of their hypocrisy.

Of course, the media is also burying the stories of discrimination against Palestinian Arabs by Syria's neighbors, even after UN officials point it out explicitly. No follow up questions, no independent investigations as to the extent of this discrimination and the hypocrisy of Arab governments who pretend to support Palestinians but treat them differently than every other Arab.