Final Day of the USPCN Delegation: Refugee Camps in Jordan & the Right of Return

Final Day of the USPCN Delegation: Refugee Camps in Jordan & the Right of Return

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After leaving Palestine, we stopped in Amman, the capital of Jordan, to celebrate the Eid; and a day later, wrapped up the delegation with a visit to the largest refugee camps in the country, Al-Baqa’a and Al-Wihdat. Jordan, with the largest population of Palestinian refugees in the world, is home to 13 camps that were established in two different periods. The first was during the Nakba; the second, after 1967, when Israel’s occupation expanded into the West Bank, Gaza, and Jerusalem, forcing Palestinians, many of whom were already refugees from 1948 Palestine, to again flee, this time to Jordan.

Al-Baqa’a is in the second category, a camp that was founded after the 1967 war. It is the largest refugee camp in Jordan, with a population of over 120,000 people living in a one square kilometer area. The Palestinians who first founded Al-Baqa’a lived in actual camps under tents, and then later built homes out of asbestos stones and zinc roofs, which led to numerous diseases and very high levels of cancer.

Currently, the services offered in the camp are stretched extremely thin. Water and electricity are provided by the Jordanian government, while the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) is responsible for education, sanitation, and healthcare.

The UNRWA services, just as in all the camps we visited in Palestine, do not cover even the basic necessities. For example, there are only 60 sanitation workers responsible for the entire camp, which means that many residents must collect and dispose of their own garbage. Also, there are only four doctors (two for children and two for adults) and one clinic in the whole camp. These conditions force the residents oftentimes to organize their own services.

We met a family whose members helped found the camp’s community center, colloquially known as Nadi Al-Baqa’a, Al-Baqa’a Club. They explained that after the 1967 war, it was extremely difficult for residents to get their daily needs met. However, in addition to food, clothing, and shelter, people also wanted to live fuller lives, to engage in discussions and political organizing, to gather in a true social, political, and cultural center. This is the function of the Nadi, which graduated and politicized an entire generation of Palestinians.

Our tour of Al-Baqa’a concluded in the camp’s main square, called Sahet Al Awda, meaning “Square of Return.” A monument (image at left) there of a giant key functions as a constant reminder of the wishes and aspirations of all residents of the camp: to return to their homes and lands in Palestine.

The second largest refugee camp in Jordan is Al-Wihdat, which has a population of 50,000 on an area of 800 square meters. Like Al-Baqa’a, services are lacking because of financial cuts and UNRWA’s bureaucratic mismanagement. There are only eight schools and two health clinics serving the entire camp. As we heard from all the other camp residents we visited throughout our two weeks in Palestine, the people of Al-Wihdat believe the solution is not a better UNRWA, but their national and human rights.

In Al-Wihdat, we had the greatest honor of meeting Abu Akram, an elder and survivor of the Nakba who was kicked out of his home outside of Jerusalem by zionist gangs in 1948. He recalled the night the zionists attacked. The villagers only had hunting rifles to defend themselves, but they still resisted for three days and two nights before the village fell.

The zionists then committed terrible atrocities, including the killing of elders, the mutilation of dead bodies, and the destruction of a mosque where over 50 injured people were seeking sanctuary. They were all killed.

Abu Akram and his fellow villagers were exiled to Jericho, where they lived as refugees in tents until they slowly built homes out of mud bricks. He lived in Jericho for years before he decided to move to Al-Wihdat to be united with other members of his family who had fled to Jordan.

As we concluded our delegation, we remembered that Abu Akram is one of almost five million Palestinian refugees and descendants from the Nakba and the Naksa, one of the largest refugee populations in the world. Israel and the U.S. do not even recognize Palestinians as refugees, but no matter where we went and who we talked to, the sentiment was the same: “we are going back to Palestine.”

And that is why USPCN and all others who organize and struggle for liberation must always clearly state the Thawabit (“Constants”) amongst the demands of the national movement: 1) Self-determination for the Palestinian people; 2) End of zionist, Israeli occupation and colonization of all Arab lands; and 3) Right of Return for all Palestinian refugees and their descendants, to the homes and lands from which they were exiled in historical Palestine (which is what Palestinians call the entire land from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea, encompassing present day Israel, the Gaza Strip, Jerusalem, and the West Bank).

This trip reminded us that there is no solution for the Palestinian/Arab vs. Israeli/U.S. conflict without the Right of Return. The end of the occupation is not enough, because Palestinians in refugee camps will never sign a peace agreement that does not guarantee their return to Haifa, Yaffa, Akka, Lifta, Qalunya, Deir Yassin, and all the other towns and villages they were forced to flee by the zionists, the Israelis, and their British and U.S. patrons.

This is our final report from this historic delegation, and we pledge to continue organizing day and night to win the Thawabit for ourselves and our people in Palestine and the diaspora. If you missed any of the other reports, visit uspcn.org and @uspcn on Twitter and Facebook. As you will recognize from reading and learning of the incredible people, institutions, and resistance in Palestine, the defeat of zionist Israel is near!

When we asked Abu Akram (foreground, image at right) for a message to our generation of Arabs and Palestinians born and living in the diaspora, he was unequivocal: “Heaven is ours in the afterlife, but Palestine must be ours in this lifetime.”

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Until Liberation & Return,

USPCN
June 16, 2018