Refugees | The American Task Force on Palestine

Palestinian camp shelters 2,000 displaced Syrians
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Ma'an News Agency
July 18, 2012 - 12:00am

Palestinians in a refugee camp near Damascus on Wednesday welcomed more than 2,000 displaced Syrians fleeing fighting that has spread to the Syrian capital. The Syrians came to al-Yarmouk camp from neighborhoods throughout the area, but many are from Al Tadamon which locals say has been bombed heavily by the Syrian army. Sources in the camp said Palestinians have organized into civil teams to organize shelter for those displaced, housing people in family homes, mosques and schools. They also formed medical teams to treat those who are injured.

Report: Jordan biased over Palestinians from Syria
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Associated Press
July 4, 2012 - 12:00am

HRW's report could not be independently verified. The Palestinians are living in a heavily-guarded housing complex near the northern border, 100 kilometers (60 miles) north of the Jordanian capital. Jordan already hosts 2 million Palestinian refugees and their descendants who fled or were driven out of their homes in Arab-Israeli wars.

Israel to begin recording settler land claims, deny Palestinians' right of appeal
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
by Chaim Levinson - July 3, 2012 - 12:00am

After 45 years of running the West Bank, the State of Israel plans to start compiling land registry records of assets controlled by settlers. The registry would bypass regular tabu land-listing processes, and appears designed to prevent Palestinians from appealing the validity of the ownership listings.

Is the PA afraid of a third intifada?
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
by Amira Hass - (Opinion) July 2, 2012 - 12:00am

The light was still too dim to penetrate the cracks in the shutters when the rooster crowed. For a fraction of a second it felt like a village. But it was the Jenin refugee camp, circa two weeks ago. There, as in other refugee camps, the rooster's wake-up call is something more: nutrition for the unemployed, as well as the longing and the desire to maintain continuity, if only symbolic, with the village that once was, and has since been destroyed.

Palestinian leaders ask Lebanon to lift military measures in camps
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Daily Star
June 28, 2012 - 12:00am

Local leaders of several Lebanon-based Palestinian factions asked the government Thursday to lift stringent military measures in the refugee camps and cease pursuing residents of the northern camp of Nahr al-Bared following clashes earlier this month. “We thank our brothers in the army’s leadership for facilitating the issue of permits and loosening security measuring until we reach an end to the military situation imposed on the camp,” a statement released by the factions said.

Palestinian: US supports 'an apartheid system that is suffocating us'
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from MSNBC
by Yara Borgal - June 28, 2012 - 12:00am

BETHLEHEM, WEST BANK – At the Aida Refugee Camp, a few blocks from Israel’s separation wall, is the Al Rowwad Cultural and Theater Center founded by Dr. Abdelfattah Abusrour in 1998 with the philosophy of “beautiful resistance” against the Israeli power over their land. Abusrour is part of the first generation of children born to refugee parents in the Aida Refugee Camp, which was established in 1950 between the towns of Bethlehem and Beit Jala. It is now home to around 5,000 inhabitants all descendants from the 1948 expulsion from Palestine.

Blocked prospects
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from NOW Lebanon
by Hazem Saghiyeh - (Opinion) June 25, 2012 - 12:00am

The Nahr al-Bared ordeal epitomizes the ordeal befalling Lebanon as a whole, including with regard to the Palestinian issue. The Nahr al-Bared camp, which is still witnessing the same long-term misery and marginalization added to destruction that was not followed by the promised reconstruction, summarizes the situation of the Palestinian “community” in Lebanon. However, it also epitomizes the inability of the sectarian regime, which is extremely attached to “balances,” to take any useful step in dealing with the Nahr al-Bared ordeal (and others as well).

Palestinian refugees with dream of returning home after 64 years
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Xinhua
June 21, 2012 - 12:00am

GAZA, June 20 (Xinhua) -- Palestinian refugee Abdel Majid al- Mabhouh, 81, does not understand the ongoing complexities in politics, but only keeps in mind his right to return to his house and his village that he was forced to leave during the 1948 Arab- Israeli war with his family.

Palestinians, Army try to contain fallout of clashes
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Daily Star
by Mohammed Zaatari - June 21, 2012 - 12:00am

SIDON, Lebanon: As calm returned to the Ain al-Hilweh and Nahr al-Bared refugee camps, Palestinian factions across Lebanon worked to contain the repercussions of two days of clashes between residents and the Lebanese Army. In a letter to residents of refugee camps in Lebanon, Maj. Gen, Sobhi Abu Arab, the head of the Palestinian National Security Forces in Lebanon, said there is daily contact between Palestinian leaders in Lebanon and the Lebanese Army command.

Dozens protest at Palestinian refugee camp in south Lebanon
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Daily Star
June 18, 2012 - 12:00am

Dozens of Palestinians protested Sunday at the Ain al-Hilweh Palestinian refugee camp in the southern coastal city of Sidon over recent clashes that led to the killing of a Palestinian teenager near a refugee camp in north Lebanon. Protesters chanted slogans condemning the use of arms against Palestinian civilians and called for establishing a committee to probe the circumstances surrounding the Friday killing of Ahmad Qassem, 15, near the Nahr al-Bared refugee camp in north Lebanon.

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