Mr. Rami Toqan, Chair
r-toqan@northwestern.edu


The conflict in the Middle East that has superseded any other political issue in the region, the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, is one of much great debate. Since the founding of Israel in 1948, when the UN envisioned portioning Palestinian territory into two states, in order to be able to accommodate European Jews after World War II. However, after a series of wars particularly the war of 1967, 77% of the territory allocated as part of the Palestinian state was annexed by Israel, forcing Palestinians to be expelled, or live as stateless individuals in refugee camps for years to come. The Arab League will discuss two critical aspects of this situation. So far only Jordan, Egypt, and Mauritania have formally signed peace treaties with and diplomatically recognized the Israeli state. Lebanon is in a state of war with the Israelis. It is the duty of the Arab League to discuss the recognition of this state, what measures must be taken to help secure the Palestinian state in order to aide the refugees. If no viable solution can be given to this problem, then is accepting the refugees as citizens of the other Arab nations feasible? As of 2004 the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) has published that the amount of displaced Palestinian refugees, or refugees not within Palestinian territory is the following:

UNRWA Registered Refugees (June 2004)
	In Camps	Not In Camps	Total
Jordan	281,211	1,477,063	1,758,274
West Bank	177,920	497,750	675,670
Gaza	464,075	474,456	938,531
Lebanon	192,557	204,333	396,890
Syria	110,450	306,896	417,346
TOTAL	1,226,213	2,960,498	4,186,711

Therefore,cleary this is a problem not just for the Palestinian Authority but our governments as well. Is it fair to say that these refugees must remain without being naturalized. In addition should something be done to assist with the atrocious state of the refugee camps established on the UNRWA’s limited budget (Possibly looking at members of the GCC (Gulf Cooperation Community) for assistance and financial aide. It is up to the Arab league to decide what diplomatic actions must be taken to find a solution to this problem. Saudi Arabia proposed in 2002 for support of the UN Resolution 242 and 338 with unanimous support. Is following in these footsteps a possibility?


http://www.un.org/unrwa/
http://www.arts.mcgill.ca/mepp/new_prrn/
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/shared/spl/hi/middle_east/03/v3_ip_timeline/html/default.stm