[News] Land Day in Palestine

[News at freedomarchives.org]

 From PalestineCalendar.org...

Today, March 30th, is Land Day in Palestine.

In addition to the links already at PalestineCalendar.org's Land Day entry, 
we bring you this press release from BADIL.  However, we would say that 
Land Day "symbolizes resistance to ongoing land expropriation, unresolved 
claims to housing and property restitution and..." the 56-year occupation 
of the Palestinian homeland, not just "the 38-year occupation of the West 
Bank and Gaza Strip."

Following the press release is a reminder of upcoming important dates, 
including the Jenin Massacre, Palestine Child Day, and the Deir Yassin 
Massacre.

Best wishes from PalestineCalendar.org.


BADIL Resource Center for Palestinian Residency and Refugee Rights
Press release, 30 March 2005 (E/09/05)

Human Rights Can Help Solve Conflict over Land
Land Day 2005

Israel is under an obligation to return the land, orchards, olive groves and
other immovable property seized from any natural or legal person for purposes
of construction of the wall in the Occupied Palestinian Territory. The
International Court of Justice also says that states are responsible to
ensure Israel's compliance with international law.

The UN draft principles on restitution for refugees and displaced persons
likewise affirms that all refugees and displaced persons have the right to
have restored to them housing and property of which they were deprived during
the course of displacement, or to be compensated for any property that cannot
be restored to them.

The draft principles also say that states should take special measures to
protect secondary occupants from homelessness and other violations of the
right to adequate housing. This includes identification of alternative
housing and/or land for such occupants as means to facilitate the
recovery/restitution of homes and properties of refugees and displaced
persons.

"The Palestinians are hardly trying to break new ground," says Scott Leckie,
Executive Director of the Geneva-base Centre on Housing Rights Rights and
Evictions. "The right to return and the right to restitution of property have
a long legal history, and have been most recently actualized in such places
as Bosnia, Kosovo, Mozambique, South Africa, Tajikistan and throughout
eastern and central Europe."

In 1998 the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination concluded
that Israel should give "high priority" to remedying the "right of many
Palestinians to return and possess their homes in Israel." The Committee on
Social, Economic and Cultural Rights has called upon Israel to review its
relationship with the World Zionist Organization/Jewish Agency (and the
Jewish National Fund), especially in relation to control of land "to benefit
Jews exclusively."

"There can be no prospect of a workable peace agreement until the return and
property restitution question is property addressed," says Leckie. "Indeed,
this is a major lesson of all post-conflict situations throughout the world:
address restitution issues head on, and more likely than not peace will hold.
Ignore it, and the war that was so hard to stop in the first place will be
much more likely eventually to re-ignite."

Land Day commemorates events of 29 years ago when Israeli security forces shot
and killed six Palestinians inside 1948 Palestine/Israel who were protesting
expropriation of Palestinian land to build new Jewish colonies and expand
existing Jewish cities.  Now Land Day symbolizes resistance to ongoing land
expropriation, unresolved claims to housing and property restitution and the
38-year occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

In 1948, Palestinians owned more than 90 per cent of the land in historic
Mandate Palestine.  Today, the indigenous Palestinian Arab population owns
and controls about 10 per cent of its homeland (within Israel and the 1967
occupied territories).  At the same time, more than half of the original
Palestinian population has been displaced/expelled from Palestine.

-- 
BADIL Resource Center for Palestinian Residency and Refugee Rights
PO Box 728, Bethlehem, Palestine
Telefax: 00972-2-2747346
<about:blank>info at badil.org - http://www.badil.org/
_______________________________________________________________

Upcoming Dates:
April 3-12, 2002: Jenin Massacre
April 5: Palestine Child Day
April 9: Deir Yassin Massacre.

The Freedom Archives
522 Valencia Street
San Francisco, CA 94110
(415) 863-9977
www.freedomarchives.org 
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