Legal Status of Refugees
Monday, 10 August 2009 14:37 | 
LEGAL STATUS
The legal right of Palestinians to return to their ancestral home from which they have been forcefully expelled or fled to save their lives is incontrovertible in international law. Unlike other refugees around the world, Palestinians have a much heightened exposure due to their intractable suffering, as well as the involvement of international players that willfully or otherwise played a part in their dispossession. Their legal right to return and reclaim their ancestral home however is continually obstructed by Israel, which has devised various legislative measures of its own to counter any implementation of the right of return and has also used the rights of refugees as a bargaining tool to secure political advantages.
The human right of any refugee, including Palestinian, is explicit and ratified under international law. Throughout the 20th century the international community assembled a set of guidelines, laws and conventions aimed at protecting the basic human rights and treatment of a growing number of people forced to flee their homes because of a fear of persecution and war. The process began in the League of Nations in 1921 culminated in the 1951 Convention relating to the Status of Refugees and its subsequent 1967 Protocol.
Together with the Protocol relating to the Status of Refugees of 31 January 1967, the 1951 Convention provides standards for the treatment of refugees in more than 130 countries. The Convention provides, as a minimum standard, that refugees should receive at least that treatment which is afforded to immigrants generally. The convention provides security over a wide range of issues: religion, artistic rights and industrial property, access to courts, legal assistance, rationing, elementary education, public relief, labor legislation and social security, and fiscal charges
This basic right of refugees has been exemplarily enforced in various conflicts around the world. In 1971 Twelve million refugees left Bangladesh, but when the War between Pakistan and Bangladesh ended they were all allowed to return to their homes. Not so in the case of Palestinians. Also after the bloody war that ripped Bosnia in the early 90s, the international community guaranteed, through the Dayton Peace Agreement in 1995, the right of refugees and displaced persons to safely return home and regain lost property, or to obtain just compensation. The Committee further instated a Commission for Displaced Persons and Refugees that decided on return of real property or compensation, with the authority to issue final decisions and furthermore all persons were granted the right to move freely throughout the country, without harassment or discrimination.
The Human right of refugees is clear in international law and global institutions have, on countless occasions, responded effectively demonstrating that human rights are inviolable and narrow political interests cannot be a reason to subordinate universal human rights. This however is the tragedy that has befallen the Palestinian people: they have continually made concessions after concessions in order to satisfy Israel's need to maintain the racial purity of a Jewish state and its expansionist aspiration demonstrated by its continual settlement building contrary to international law.
The right of return is an enshrined right for the Palestinian refugees recognized at the outset. The first UN Mediator, Count Bernadotte, who was murdered by Israeli terrorists, exerted all his efforts to secure the repatriation Palestinian refugees, which the Israelis refused to accept. The general assembly adopted resolution 194 (iii) in 1948 declaring its recognition of the right of return. The UN mandated the Conciliatory Committee to oversee the rightful settlement and repatriation of the refugees an organization which has now become moribund due to powerful political forces that wish to prevent application of this legal right.
WHY HAVE THE LEGAL RIGHTS NOT BEEN ENFORCED?
Palestinian refugees are still refugees because they are unable to exercise their basic human right to return to their homes of origin. Israel refuses to allow the refugees to return to villages, towns and cities inside Israel due to the ethnic, national and religious origin of the refugees. Israel defines itself as a Jewish state and not a state of all its citizens. This self-definition emphasizes the need for a permanent Jewish majority, Jewish control of key resources like land, and the link between Israel and the Jewish diaspora. Jewish citizens, residents and the Jewish diaspora are therefore granted special preferences to citizenship and land ownership.
Israel's laws prevent Palestinian refugees and IDPs from returning to their homes of origin. Palestinians must be able to prove that they were in the state of Israel on or after 14 July 1952, or the offspring of a Palestinian who meets this condition. Due to the fact that most Palestinian refugees were displaced outside the territory of the state of Israel on or after this date, they are unable to resume domicile in their homeland. Israel's longstanding occupation of the West Bank, eastern Jerusalem, and Gaza Strip and related military orders and administrative procedures prevents refugees from returning to these areas. Emergency regulations, abandoned property laws, military orders and other administrative measures alienate refugees from their land which has been transferred to the state of Israel and the Jewish National Fund as the inalienable property of the Jewish people.
The international community has not exerted sufficient political will to advance durable solutions consistent with international law and relevant UN resolutions. Refugee rights have been absent from the Middle East Peace Process since it began in Madrid in the early 1990s. Unlike peace agreements elsewhere, agreements between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) are based solely on an agreed-upon political process between the parties. International law does not provide a framework for conflict resolution and the regulation of future relations between the parties. There is no explicit reference to the right of Palestinian refugees and displaced persons to return to their homes of origin. Nor is there explicit reference to the right to housing and property restitution. The agreements only establish fora in which the parties agree to discuss the future status of Palestinian refugees
