Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council

Allon Lee

For the first time in many years there has recently been an intense media focus on how international aid is spent on the Palestinians and why the number of Palestinian refugees in the world is constantly increasing.

Phillip Adams interviewed United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) Commissioner General Filippo Grandi, who visited Australia in June. Whilst Grandi was here, the Australian Government agreed to gift UNRWA A$90 million over five years.

One comment by Grandi partly showed how UNWRA helps delay an end to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. He said "To be a refugee, to maintain one's rights as refugees does not mean that you don't have a right to a better life, to better opportunities." If assistance comes wrapped in a promise that you are entitled to maintain your "rights" as a refugee even if you have citizenship in another country, then no realistic peace plan will ever satisfy Palestinian refugee demands.

Grandi said that "I often hear stories that [Palestinian refugees have] been mistreated in Arab countries. Palestinians in Jordan and Syria have been treated better than in many Western countries." It is interesting how he downplayed how Palestinian refugees in Lebanon are given only severely restricted rights to work and cannot own property or access state medical assistance or education; 450,000 Kuwaiti Palestinians were expelled in 1991; Syria and Lebanon refuse to allow people carrying Palestinian passports a right of entry, while Jordan has recently been stripping some Palestinians of citizenship, ABC Radio National "Late Night Live" (May 30).

Greg Sheridan questioned Australia's ongoing support for UNRWA. "Australia is the seventh largest donor to UNWRA...It defines as a refugee every descendant of any Palestinian who left Palestine at the time five Arab nations launched a war against Israel in 1948. Thus if you are a citizen of Jordan with your own business, even a member of the Jordanian cabinet, but your grandfather came from Palestine, you are a refugee, according to UNWRA. As a result it makes the Israel-Palestine dispute insoluble. Unlike all other refugees, this status is inheritable infinitely through the generations and never extinguished despite gaining other citizenship," Australian (June 2).

Alan Howe expressed reservations about Australian taxes going to UNWRA, stipulating that "until Palestinians... demand a leadership that will point them towards modernity and away from the ancient hatreds of uneducated Islamism, I'd be reluctant to give them one cent." Howe argued the money should go to "deserving people" like East Timorese who "are poorer than the Palestinians, spend fewer years at school, are more likely to be illiterate and are much less likely to have access to electricity and sanitation," Herald Sun (June 4).

ABC Radio reported on the anomalous status of Palestinian refugees but unfortunately the report featured not-so-subtle insinuations that any effort to reconsider the refugee question is essentially a right-wing plot.

Host Eleanor Hall wrongly claimed that plans such as those being advocated by some US politicians for reclassifying Palestinian refugees would mean only those "personally affected by the creation of Israel in 1948 can qualify for aid."

Her colleague, Middle East correspondent Anne Barker interviewed former Israeli journalist David Bedein, who now runs the Israel Resource News Agency, which Barker unfairly described as "a far-right lobby group" - immediately implying to listeners that he is an extremist whose views should be rejected. Although the story included a short explanation by Bedein of why he believes UNRWA is problematic, listeners might have appreciated more detail, such as the explanation he wrote for Jwire on June 5: "In 1950, UNRWA defined a refugee as someone who had ‘lost his home and his means of livelihood' during the 1948 war... Fifteen years later, UNRWA decided - against objections from western nations - to include as refugees the children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren of those who left Israel. In 1982, UNRWA extended eligibility to all subsequent generations of descendants - forever."

Barker asked controversial UNRWA spokesperson Chris Gunness about anti-Israel incitement included in Palestinian UNWRA textbooks to which he responded that UNWRA "has to work with the system that is there." But UNRWA has attempted to influence the curriculum in the past, as seen last year when it wanted to teach Palestinian children about the Holocaust - an initiative vehemently opposed by Hamas and Fatah.

Gunness falsely implied determining Palestinian refugee status is no different to any other people: "That is how refugees are defined, whether... dealing with Afghan refugees... or... dealing with Cambodian refugees." But of course, Palestinian "refugees" have a separate, unique definition to all other refugee groups, ABC Radio "World Today" (June 7).