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News from the Region
Legacies of 1948 Delegation

Legacies of 1948 Delegation
Report #3: Sixty Years Later – An Ongoing Nakba

A Conflict About Land

By Travis Green

Until today, our delegation has been focused on the West Bank and the Occupation. We heard from the U.N. about the checkpoints, the Separation Wall, and closures. We toured East Jerusalem with ICHAD and learned about the intentional removal of Palestinian residents from their own land. We visited a Israeli settlement and traveled on a “settler only” road. We visited Bil'in and heard about their courageous efforts to change the path of the wall.

Until today, we heard how the Occupation--which began in 1967--led to Israeli human rights violations against Palestinians in the West Bank.

Our trip to Galilee in northern Israel changed everything. Standing on the foundations of Palestinian homes with their previous occupants brought a deeper understanding of this conflict and its origins. We toured two villages on the Israeli side of the Green Line (the border that separates the West Bank and Israel) with the families that were displaced after 1948 by their destruction. These Palestinian families, who have Israeli citizenship, were never permitted to return to their homes when the 1948 war ended. Instead, living just a few miles away, they were forced to watch their homes demolished. Until recently, they were banned from the sites of their former villages and could not maintain the graves of their ancestors.

Standing with these families, it became clear how much this conflict is about land--not religion. There would be no security reason that would block these Israeli Palestinian families from returning to their villages. There is no reason why the State should prevent families from tending to the graves of their loved ones. Instead, I believe that Israel is fearful of acknowledging the rights of land owners that predate 1948. After all, acknowledging the rights of one Palestinian family to property they owned before the establishment of Israel would set a significant precedent.

We ended the day over dinner with a Palestinian Israeli family that was forced to build illegally on their own property because Israel claimed they no longer owned it. Despite their records, they were threatened with demolition. Earlier in the day, a Palestinian girl urged us to think what we would do if these were "our children". I can't imagine.

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