it was may of one nine hundred forty eight in the hague holland two former nazis were sentenced to death for their participation in the sauder of six million jews james michener in tennessee williams were awarded the pulitzer prize the united states had exploded an atomic bomb in the south pacific joe di maggio hit three consecutive home runs and the thirty five year british mandate over palestine expired leading to the establishment of the state of israel hundred forty eight was a triumph in their quest for a safe haven from the centuries of persecution culminating in the holocaust but for the palestinians they displace this event is known as a or the catastrophe in america and europe popular sympathy for a jewish state had been growing and when david ben gurion proclaimed the state of israel on may fourteenth one thousand nine hundred eighty eight he knew that he had the backing of many governments including the soviet union but israel's claim to sovereignty was immediately challenged by the surrounding arab states egypt lebanon syria iraq and saudi arabia and within twenty four hours the ongoing border skirmishes became a full scale war the battle was hard fought in some areas such as laws but the arab armies were no match for the israelis the jewish militia the hagana quickly defeated the various arab forces that stood in their way as thousands of terrified palestinians fled their villages or were forcibly removed by the advancing in some villages the inhabitants were rounded up and executed and as word of these massacres spread many more villagers began to leave in panic others simply left believing that they would return to their homes when the fighting was over finally i said ok you know raise the flag and bring all the people into the church a catholic church and i happened to be  that they started calling everybody to go to church they went to church and then the israeli man a military man stood out with  and he told the people and i believe it was it was is how could have been i'm not sure but i believe it was him he says ok you go home carry what you can with your hand and stand that's the way to go east and some people who could walk there walked into the days they were there but some people like my mother at the time with a twin ten days old when they couldn't walk fast enough so it took on a week before they got there but what caused a land where people of many ethnicities had lived in relative harmony for centuries to become divided in violence of violence that persists to this day to answer this question we must first examine the history of the region up to the united nations plan for the partition of palestine in one thousand nine hundred seven from the first century current era onward palestine particularly the area known as the holy land has been under one foreign occupation after another jews christians and muslims made up the indigenous population with the spread of islam muslim arabs predominated meanwhile after centuries of persecution and nationalist movement arose among the jewish communities in europe and in russia the ambition of this group who called themselves zionist was to redeem the land of palestine as the inalienable possession of the jewish people and in one thousand nine hundred two the first contingent of twenty five thousand zionist settlers arrived in palestine with the assistance of the french in the first decade of the twentieth century with a world war brewing in europe and asia minor forty thousand more jewish immigrants joined the ranks of the zionist settlers during the war the turks were driven out of palestine by the british and their arab allies and in one nine hundred sixteen the area was divided into provinces under british and french control a year later the british government issued the balfour declaration it proposed a jewish homeland in palestine under a british administration however the idea was opposed by the first palestinian national congress in one nine hundred seventeen as well as many prominent jewish leaders in europe who predicted that much trouble could come from such a venture but why shouldn't jews have a homeland dr jeske n n explains the difficulties to very good question it's a very complex question and if you look at the way the question is asked it says why shouldn't use have a homeland doesn't say why should jews have a state and you know given that we live in the twenty first century and we're coming out of the twentieth century it should be really obvious that jews do have many homelands just as christians have many homelands just as muslims have many homeland and that the idea that there should be privileged homeland for one religious group over another religious group really smacks of racism and that you know in this era in the modern era the way we the way we're kind of confronting you know what the world is presenting right now in terms of war social injustice bigotry hatred and racism we can no longer tolerate a kind of ideology or a kind of racism that says that one kind of group whether it be based on religious or other kinds of perspectives is privileged over another group so i would say you know it's clear that that muslims that christians and jews have many kinds of homeland and it should be guaranteed and in fact if you look at the current demography of the distribution of jews christians and muslims all over the world people are distributed they live they work they function all over the world when you start talking about a privileged and special place for one religious group over another based on some sort of religious ideology again that smacks of a certain kind of racism which we cannot tolerate anymore and that's why the concept of a date so to speak for one religious group exclusively over another cannot be tolerated in the modern era or in any or for that matter colonization of palestine continued after the war from one thousand nine hundred to one nine hundred twenty three another thirty five thousand jewish immigrants came to the region increasing their population to twelve percent the conditions now existed for two competing nationalist aspirations under the rule of a foreign power during the one nine hundred twenty s in an effort to confront an arab majority that was becoming increasingly wary of the growing jewish influence jewish militants formed an underground militia known as the  self defense force from one thousand nine hundred forty one nine hundred thirty nine the rise of fascism in europe produced an accelerated influx of jews bringing the total jewish population in palestine up to thirty percent throughout the  thirty s sporadic violence erupted between the arab population jewish settlers and the british security forces claiming the lives of over five hundred jews and two thousand arabs during world war two some sixty thousand jews fling hitler managed to seek refuge in palestine and by the end of the war they had created a militia of over sixty five thousand men and guerrilla groups such as the stern gang were targeting the british administration with bombings and assassinations as their mandate in palestine was about to expire the british sought help from the newly formed united nations to create a solution to the impending crisis in palestine and in one thousand nine hundred seven a un plan to partition palestine into jewish and arab sectors was passed by a vote of thirty three to fourteen with ten abstentions the arab delegates walked out under this plan un resolution one eighty one fifty seven percent of palestine mostly desert was assigned to jews with the remaining forty three percent given over to arabs but the terms of resolution one eighty one implied that the existing populations in each area had the right to remain and become citizens of the respective states regardless of their ethnicity and could not be coerced into leaving against their will it even went on to say that palestinian citizens shall upon the recognition of independence become citizens of the state in which they are resident and enjoy full civil and political rights persons over the age of eighteen years may act within one year from the date of recognition of independence of the state in which they reside for citizenship of the other state vehemently opposed to the partition of palestine the arabs begin to form their own militias and neighboring arab states readied their troops as the british forces prepared for departure the stage was now set for a battle that would lead to the creation of the state of israel in may of one thousand nine hundred eighty eight and the displacement of over seven hundred fifty thousand palestinians as refugees in the wake of the massive exodus of palestinians from israel the un general assembly passed resolution one ninety four in december of one thousand nine hundred eighty eight establishing the right of return for refugees the us was one of the thirty five countries voting for it resolution one ninety four resolved that the refugees wishing to return to their homes and live in peace with their neighbors 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 the loss direct consequence of the war launched by the arab states which were entirely responsible for that as well as for other forms of suffering inflicted by that war and that it was wrong to describe the refugees as having been driven out rather they had fled in an atmosphere of fear insecurity and danger inseparable from war nevertheless as a condition for its membership in the un israel announced its acceptance of obligations to make compensation for abandoned lands and gave a tentative acceptance of resolution one ninety four by declaring that israel did not exclude the possibility of a measure of repatriation during more than fifty years since the resolution was passed no palestinian refugee has ever been repatriated we ask to explain why you know the right of return is not a new concept and it's not necessarily new at all for palestinians or specific to palestinians rather it's a concept that actually has a very long history it's a concept that  applies to lots of different groups and even in the relatively recent modern era we have lots of examples of refugees being afforded the right to return to their homes more recently for example there are examples after the  actual consequences of war were a refugee problem has been committed and refugees are guaranteed and afforded the right to return to their homes so it seems rather remarkable that all these examples where refugees are allowed to return to their homes historically for you know as long as we have recorded history but for some reason palestinian refugees are excluded from that that kind of right that kind of  alienable right that non negotiable right for some reason it seems like palestinians have never been afforded that right even though all these other refugees have have had that opportunity to return to their homes and there's three three places within international law that guarantee refugees right and specifically the palestinian right to return to their homes there's the international declaration of human rights which guarantees that refugees can return to their homes there's the geneva convention which governs the action of you know the actions of the consequences of war the ford i mean basically during war and after war which guarantees that palestinians and the refugees have a right to return and then  there's u n un resolution one thousand four of which israel is a signatory to which guarantees that palestinian refugees at the earliest possible time should be afforded the right to return to their homes so it's not just to th country of origin it's specifically to the village home of origin and so we have it basically enshrined at three levels of international law that the palestinian right of return is guaranteed dr compares the palestinian right of return to the jewish law of return which grants all jews the right to settle in israel the jewish law of return is actually quite disturbing if if we if we kind of look at it dispassionately and what it basically says is that a jew anywhere in the world has the right to return to the state of israel irrespective of their birth history irrespective of their ethnicity irrespective of whatever his sturrock trajectory that they themselves have been and it has gotten even to the more ludicrous level where recently four hundred peruvian indigenous in indians were brought into israel into settlements in the west bank who were converted essentially a month before their arrival these were indigenous native peruvian indians who had been converted to christianity who were going through very stark poverty conditions in peru and who were given this opportunity by the government of israel to actually come into west bank settlements if they converted to judaism which they did not that in my mind seems bizarre because here we have indigenous proven indians coming to p and having the right to go into a settlement on palestinian land and i as a palestinian have no right to do that it seems rather bizarre that again one ethnic one religious group is privileged over another  and is afforded the right to return to a land for which they have no connection to yet a palestinian like myself whether they're christian or muslim has no right at this point to return to their home and frankly that that just seems like make it racism to me and it's part of this this race a structure that you know the state of israel is is built on where one group is privileged over another there are color problems you know also because if you look at the kind of racism that exists in israel right now there's a deep kind of racist divide between palestinians who have israeli citizenship palestinian arabs who are christians and muslims who are treated as fourth class citizens and then you have this whole kind of color spectrum within israel like ethiopian or black jews for example are true did horrifically and kind of ghettoized much like african americans are have been ghettoized in the united states and throughout the world and at the top of the privileged are basically white european jews and so you have the same racist structure that this country the united states had to confront during the civil rights era which we still confront is endemic within israel right now and in my mind this idea of like the law of return based on a religious ideology is rather ridiculous i mean i would ask people to kind of think about what what would happen in the united states for example if we said only christians could come to the united states it would be ridiculous it just doesn't exist anywhere else in the world and i think it's time that people confronted this kind of this kind of exclusionary structure that exists right now this kind of racism that exists and it's time to really confront this not withstanding the guarantee of palestinian and all refugee refugees the right to return home based on international law we also have this kind of given inalienable right that an individual palestinian refugee or any refugee has to return to their home and no  treaty no government can sign away that individual in the right so we see that refugees and specifically palestinian refugees in terms of their right to return to their homes are supported by bo international law which guarantees it as well as this individual right that a specific refugee has the complexities involved with compensation r r r r truly you know it's a very complex issue for many reasons specifically the issue of compensation typically gets looked at as either compensation in lieu of the right of return or in exchange for the right of return when in fact with contemporary analyses the way we really look at it is that there should be compensation in addition to the right of return in other words it's an individual choice of the specific refugee or refugee family i mean if  palestinian refugee is afforded their their right to return to their home not only should they be given that right but they should also be afforded compensation if someone chooses not to return to their home that's a different equation in terms of compensatory  terms of compensation or any kind of compensatory analysis so without going into the details i think that that particular question will best be addressed once you know refugees are allowed to go home but how could such a small country as israel possibly absorb all these refugees without destroying its character and identity can end explains you know israel is so small there's no room for the refugees to return and oh my god all these refugees there's no room but actually dr a palestinian demographer has done really groundbreaking work on this and he's really come to a rather extraordinary conclusion number one he found that for example that about eighty percent of israelis live on only fifteen percent of israel i think that's really an important statistic so i want to say it again the overwhelming majority of israelis only live on fifteen percent of the land so clearly the there is room there's plenty of room if the majority of israelis are only living on fifteen percent of the land of palestine that means that palestinian refugees can come back and that there is plenty of room here's another very important statistic of the let's say of the five hundred  fourteen palestinian villages that were depopulated in one nine hundred forty eight were refugees were forcibly removed from their homes ninety percent of those villages remain empty and unpopulated to this day so i think it's important to realize that number one there is room and the overwhelming majority of villages that were depopulated still exist today i i think that they need to get over jews really need to confront their their self deception about this issue and that clearly what is happening is that these fears are not founded any society that's based on a more reality any society that's based on racism hatred and bigotry which is really what the israeli society is built on now is going to have a paradoxical effect and that the only way for jews to feel safe the only way for people and in the larger middle east to feel safe is to is to afford palestinians the right to be treated equally is to afford palestinians the right to self determination to afford palestinians the right to equal freedoms among all the other peoples of the land of palestine and allow palestinian refugees to come home if they are afforded that just like jews lived freely in palestine b before nine hundred forty eight again palestine be can become a multi ethnic multi religious tolerant society as it was before nine hundred forty eight and therefore there will be no fear whatsoever continuing with the current form of occupation the current form of oppression the current form of home demolitions all of the targeted assassinations and the brutality of the occupation that the israelis are engaged in right now is only going to create an atmosphere where of course it's not going to be safe for anybody so once the israelis are able to confront the immorality of what they're doing the fundamental race the structure of their society if they're willing to turn that around then truly jews christians and muslims will be able to live harmoniously and freely as i said as they did before nine hundred forty eight in palestine in april of two thousand and four israeli prime minister ariel sharon and u s president george bush reached an agreement in exchange for an israeli withdrawal from gaza the palestinian refugees right of return would be relinquished no palestinian refugees were consulted in this decision whether to heads of state have the authority to negate a longstanding u n resolution is an open question for their party supporters of israel's position point out that only a small fraction of the original refugees remain alive that because of ties to terrorist groups many refugees are disqualified to live in peace with their neighbors and in any case a un general assembly resolution is not legally binding today most of the villages that were abandoned in  forty eight lie in ruins or have long ago been built over by israeli development yet despite all this the refugees remain numbering nearly four million they are scattered in fifty eight camps in four different countries and inhabit scores of other countries and they are just as determined as ever to reclaim what they believe is right