Press Releases

PR/EN/30032015/09

To our Palestinian brothers and sisters worldwide, on this historic occasion, the commemoration of Land Day;

During this devastating era of segregation, fragmentation, violence and extremism;

Under accelerated, unrelenting and systematic forcible displacement of the Palestinian people by the Israeli regime;

With the shameful acquiescence of the international community;

On this day, here, in the village of Wadi Fukin, a Palestinian community under the threat of displacement, we, Palestinian civil society organizations announce the establishment and launch of the Global Palestinian Refugee Network.

To the Palestinian people, organizations and institutions:

Because the rights of Palestinian refugees and internally displaced persons are inalienable and nondepletable;

Because displacement is ongoing, from the Nakba of 1948 and continuing until today, inside Mandate Palestine and in the countries of refuge;

Because two thirds of the Palestinian population have experienced displacement at least once in their life time;

Because the international community has woefully failed to fulfill its responsibilities and obligations towards the Palestinian people as sanctioned and required by international law;

Because Israel, the arm of Zionist movement, continues driving the displacement of Palestinians and is not willing to stop its policies of dispossession of Palestinians,

Because the only solution is a rights-based solution;

Because the right of return of Palestinian refugees and internally displaced persons to their places of origin, including properties restitution and compensation, is fundamental to just and lasting peace;

Because the struggle for human rights, against the ongoing Nakba and in the face of the failure of Israel and the international community to uphold international law requires collective action, founded in a collective strategy from one people united;

The Global Palestinian Refugee Network has been established to provide a framework for the collective and strategic struggle for the realization of the rights of Palestinian refugees and internally displaced persons, specifically, the rights recognized under the United Nations General Assembly Resolution 194 of 1948 and the United Nations Security Council Resolution 237 of 1967.

We the founders of the Global Palestinian Refugee Network affirm our identity as an independent, Palestinian body committed to human rights and comprised of Palestinian civil society organizations from Mandate Palestine and around the globe. Our role is to provide a unified, collective and strategic framework for the engagement and participation of Palestinian refugees and internally displaced persons to stop the ongoing Nakba by confronting Israeli policies of displacement, colonialism and apartheid.

We call on all Palestinian civil society organizations and institutions in Palestine and abroad to join us in the struggle in pursuing our individual and collective rights, as is it our national duty and obligation.

One People, One Struggle against the Ongoing Nakba: Global Palestinian Refugee Network