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The United Nations Relief Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA) was set up by the U.N. in 1949, separate from the relief agency for refugees worldwide, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees ("UNHCR"). The United States provides a great deal of the funding. The current administration correctly questions the wisdom of this course of action. See What Is Unrwa and What Would It Mean if Trump Cuts Its Funding?
First, there is a great deal of misuse of the money. None of it is used to resettle the refugees in other Arab lands. Even money that isn't wasted in graft is used for perpetual stirring of the pot. General Assembly Resolution 194, adopted December 11, 1948 (link) states in relevant part the goal of the UNWRA:
Quote:
Originally Posted by UN Resolution 194
11. Resolves that the refugees wishing to return to their homes and live at peace with their neighbours 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 in equity, should be made good by the Governments or authorities responsible;
Instructs the Conciliation Commission to facilitate the repatriation, resettlement and economic and social rehabilitation of the refugees and the payment of compensation, and to maintain close relations with the Director of the United Nations Relief for Palestine Refugees and, through him, with the appropriate organs and agencies of the United Nations;
The UNRWA's site states as its mission:
Quote:
Originally Posted by UNRWA
Palestine refugees
UNRWA is unique in terms of its long-standing commitment to one group of refugees. It has contributed to the welfare and human development of four generations of Palestine refugees, defined as “persons 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.” The descendants of Palestine refugee males, including legally adopted children, are also eligible for registration.
UNRWA services are available to all those living in its areas of operations who meet this definition, who are registered with the Agency and who need assistance. When the Agency began operations in 1950, it was responding to the needs of about 750,000 Palestine refugees. Today, some 5 million Palestine refugees are eligible for UNRWA services.
(emphasis supplied) The UNRWA has presided over an expansion, in all likelihood deliberate, of a miserable refugee community. The people are being held in limbo in the vain expectation that Israel will simply go away.
By contrast the UNHCR's "primary purpose is to safeguard the rights and well-being of refugees. It strives to ensure that everyone can exercise the right to seek asylum and find safe refuge in another State, with the option to return home voluntarily, integrate locally or to resettle in a third country. It also has a mandate to help stateless people." (emphasis supplied) (link to UNHCR site). The UNHCR's mission recognizes the unreality of returning refugees to unwelcoming, changed and dangerous situations.
There is no reason that the U.S. should deliberately fund a ticking time bomb aimed at Israel, the U.S. and ultimately the world.
The Arabs seem upset with anything that recognizes Israel as a permanent fact of life. For example, President Johnson announced, on February 7, 1964 a commitment to fund Israel's development of desalination. In an article by Seth Siegel, the author of Let There be Water, entitled Desalination: Science, engineering and alchemy (link) Mr. Siegel described his speech at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel on February 6, 1964:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Seth Siegel article excerpt
When Johnson stepped to the podium at the Waldorf- Astoria Hotel ballroom to greet the seventeen hundred dinner guests and Weizmann Institute donors in February 1964, few likely expected Johnson to set in motion a project that on the one hand would spark an immediate firestorm in the Arab world, but on the other would promise a significant boost to Israel’s own desalination efforts....” From Damascus to Beirut to Cairo, Johnson’s speech was met with fury. One Lebanese newspaper columnist addressed the Texas- born, Disciples of Christ church- president as “Johnson the Jew” and said that the speech went “beyond recognition of the birth of Israel to recognition of Israel’s future.”
Anything that normalizes Israel's permanence, it their mind, is problematic. The fact is, there are giant migrations of people in the world. The migration of Jews to Israel is not the first and won't be the last.
Why did the UN create reparations for a group of people that were part of the war that was started by Arabs and lost by Arabs? Why didn't the UN create one for Jews after WW2 as they were unable to return to their homes and livelihoods?
If the UNRWA was set up for those are defined as “persons whose normal place of residence was Palestine during the period 1 June 1946 to 15 May 1948, which puts those as being 70 years old and older (as of 2018), why is it being paid out to multiple generations and to those who are younger? Why is it being paid out to multiple generations and to those who are younger who live in other countries? Why is the leadership of the UNRWA allowed to spend the funds as they wish and not directly for the age group it was intended for?
How many of those who fit the original definition are still alive?
And before someone brings up Germany's payments, they only go to the generation that was affected, the following generations get nothing.
Palestine has been getting screwed over for years. And portrayed as the "bad guys".
Quote:
Originally Posted by hotkarl
Israel is the Nazi Germany of the region, yet portrayed as the "good guys".
The truth is out there if you are interested enough.
I will respond to both posts even though, unless you are in sarcasm mode, it is hard to take you seriously.
After WW II West Germany (and possibly East Germany as well) absorbed lots of Sudeten Germans expelled by Czechoslovakia. See The Germans and Czechs trying to deal with ghosts of the past. See also The Expulsion Of The Germans: The Largest Forced Migration In History (link, excerpt below):
Millions of civilians living in the eastern German provinces that were to be turned over to Poland after the war were to be driven out and deposited among the ruins of the former Reich, to fend for themselves as best they could. The Prime Minister did not mince words. What was planned, he forthrightly declared, was “the total expulsion of the Germans... For expulsion is the method which, so far as we have been able to see, will be the most satisfactory and lasting.”
*********
To the present day, expelling states continue to go to great lengths to exclude the deportations and their continuing effects from the reach of international law. In October 2009, for example, the current President of the Czech Republic, Václav Klaus, refused to sign the European Union’s Lisbon Treaty unless his country was granted an “exemption” ensuring that surviving expellees could not use the Treaty to seek redress for their maltreatment in the European courts. Facing the collapse of the accord in the event of Czech non-ratification, the EU reluctantly acquiesced.
Two most obvious additional examples involve the Jews:
The expulsion of most of them from Europe since they were unable to return to their historical cities, towns and villages since the "locals" had seized or destroyed them; and
The Jewish denizens of Yemen, Iraq, Syria, and Egypt, many of whom lived in these places since the destruction of the First Temple.
In all three cases they expellees were absorbed, respectively, by the two Germanies and the State of Israel. The Sudetens were not put into grim camps so that they would constantly be launching attacks into Czechoslovakia. They were not encouraged to copulate to feed an insurgency. Their children were not schooled to hate. The Jewish expellees were not turned into suicide bombers to attack interests in Germany, Poland, France, the Netherlands, Hungary or Arab world. Why are the Arab governments any more privileged, besides the love of Western liberals to cosset them?
Why? Their position was created by Europe who has been trying to kill off the Jews for nearly 2000 years. Hatred for Jews was not the norm until Europeans brought it with them. Jews were relatively safe living in Africa and the Middle East during the same time period.
Why? Their position was created by Europe who has been trying to kill off the Jews for nearly 2000 years. Hatred for Jews was not the norm until Europeans brought it with them. Jews were relatively safe living in Africa and the Middle East during the same time period.
I'm not sure what you're asking "why" on? My thread is about how the fate of the "Palestinians" is a smokescreen for the issue of getting rid of Israel; something I hope doesn't happen.
Palestine has been getting screwed over for years. And portrayed as the "bad guys".
Until rockets cease getting fired from Gaza towards Israel; until suicide bombers stop killing themselves and dozens of innocents in their proximity; until school children stop being taught to hate and despite the Jews and desire to kill them; until the people as a whole start having the least bit of desire to live as normal people instead of as perpetual "victims" sucking off the world's teat while simultaneously giving them the finger; until these things happen, "Palestine" isn't getting screwed over enough.
If they want to stop being portrayed as the bad guys, then stop being the bad guys. It really is just that simple.
To address the OP's question: all "refugee" aid to the Palestinians should be halted immediately. They've had, what, 70-some years to get their house in order, yet they're no closer to wishing to live in peace with their neighbors than they were when this whole mess started. The world (which, in the context of the United Nations, mainly means the U.S.) should stop enabling them to continue living their self-destructive and other-destructive lives and let them sink or swim on their own.
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