[Congressional Bills 117th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Res. 1123 Introduced in House (IH)]
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117th CONGRESS
2d Session
H. RES. 1123
Recognizing the Nakba and Palestinian refugees' rights.
_______________________________________________________________________
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
May 16, 2022
Ms. Tlaib (for herself, Ms. Ocasio-Cortez, Ms. Omar, Ms. McCollum, Ms.
Newman, Mr. Bowman, and Ms. Bush) submitted the following resolution;
which was referred to the Committee on Foreign Affairs
_______________________________________________________________________
RESOLUTION
Recognizing the Nakba and Palestinian refugees' rights.
Whereas the United Nations General Assembly recommended on November 29, 1947, to
partition Palestine into two states against the wishes of Palestine's
majority indigenous inhabitants;
Whereas this partition plan nevertheless provided for the ``Full protection for
the rights and interests of minorities, including the protection of the
linguistic, religious and ethnic rights of the peoples and respect for
their cultures, and full equality of all citizens with regard to
political, civil and religious matters'';
Whereas before the State of Israel declared its independence on May 14, 1948,
there were already between 250,000 to 300,000 Palestinian refugees who
were expelled or fled from their homes often after attacks by Zionist
militias on major Palestinian cities and villages;
Whereas by the time the war ended with the signing of armistice agreements
between Israel and neighboring Arab countries in 1949, establishing
Israel's sovereignty over 78 percent of Palestine, and, in the process,
conquering an additional 23 percent of Palestine beyond those areas
allocated to the Jewish state under the partition plan, there were at
least 750,000 Palestinian refugees (roughly 75 percent of the indigenous
population that had lived in areas that became Israel);
Whereas, by 1949, Israel had depopulated more than 400 Palestinian villages and
cities, often demolishing all structures, planting forests over them, or
repopulating them with Jewish Israelis;
Whereas Palestinians refer to this experience of uprooting, dispossession, and
refugeedom as the Nakba (meaning ``catastrophe'' in English);
Whereas the Nakba refers not only to a historical event but to an ongoing
process of Israel's expropriation of Palestinian land and its
dispossession of the Palestinian people that continues to this day
through the establishment and expansion of approximately 300 illegal
settlements and outposts in the occupied Palestinian West Bank in which
approximately 674,000 Israelis reside as of 2020;
Whereas the United States knew of the scale and magnitude of the Palestine
refugee crisis as it unfolded, as is documented in an October 1948
telegram to the President and Secretary of State from the Embassy of the
United States to Israel, warning that the ``Arab Refugee tragedy is
rapidly reaching catastrophic proportions and should be treated as a
disaster'';
Whereas the United States voted in favor of United Nations General Assembly
Resolution 194 on December 11, 1948, which states that Palestinian
``refugees wishing to return to their homes and live at 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 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'';
Whereas Palestinian refugees' right of return is not only stipulated in a
General Assembly resolution, but is also anchored in international law
and in Article 13 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which
states: ``Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his
own, and to return to his country'';
Whereas, on December 8, 1949, the United Nations General Assembly adopted
Resolution 302 establishing the United Nations Relief and Works Agency
for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, which the United States has
financially supported on an almost continuous basis since its
establishment;
Whereas of the more than 7,000,000 Palestinian refugees, the United Nations
Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East provides
much-needed social services to 5,700,000 Palestine refugees today;
Whereas international law also recognizes that descendants of refugees retain
their rights as refugees, and that according to the United Nations,
``Palestine refugees are not distinct from other protracted refugee
situations such as those from Afghanistan or Somalia, where there are
multiple generations of refugees, considered by UNHCR as refugees and
supported as such. Protracted refugee situations are the result of the
failure to find political solutions to their underlying political
crises''; and
Whereas a just and lasting resolution requires respect for and the
implementation of Palestine refugee rights as enshrined in United
Nations General Assembly Resolution 194 and the Universal Declaration of
Human Rights: Now, therefore, be it
Resolved, That it is the sense of the House of Representatives that
it is the policy of the United States to--
(1) commemorate the Nakba through official recognition and
remembrance;
(2) reject efforts to enlist, engage, or otherwise
associate the United States Government with denial of the
Nakba;
(3) encourage education and public understanding of the
facts of the Nakba, including the United States role in the
humanitarian relief effort, and the relevance of the Nakba to
modern-day refugee crises;
(4) continue to support the provision of social service to
Palestinian refugees through the United Nations Relief and
Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East; and
(5) support the implementation of Palestinian refugees'
rights as enshrined in United Nations General Assembly
Resolution 194 and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
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