"The road to Al Quds [the Arabic name for the city of Jerusalem] is south and direct, it does not wind all over Syria."
"After May of 2000 when the Israeli were forced from Lebanon ["Chaos and humiliation as Israel pulls out of Lebanon", The Guardian], we were grateful to Hezbollah and Hassan Nasrallah [Lebanese political and paramilitary party Hezbollah politician] was much admired. Also in 2006 despite 1,300 civilian casualties. That respect and support has eroded due to so-called Resistance projects in Syria."
"Few Palestinians or Syrians support the Resistance as they did before it invaded Syria."
"The Resistance has killed more Palestinians in Syria during the past five years than the Zionists have killed Palestinians over the past 68 years since the Nakba. What kind of Palestinian Resistance is this?"
Resistance
Some of these strong comments may not be agreed to by many, but one way the Resistance can help Palestinians in Lebanon to regain confidence is for Hezbollah to take 90 minutes in Parliament; 60 minutes of which to grant Palestinian refugees in Lebanon the same elementary civil right to work that every other Resistance movement and country grants refugees. Hezbollah can then use the remaining 30 minutes in Parliament to repeal the racist 2001 law that forbids any Palestinian from owning a home outside one of Lebanon's squalid and deteriorating camps.
Resistance actions speak louder than just Resistance words. In ninety minutes with political will the Parliament could unblock the elementary civil rights to work and to own a home for Palestinian refugees in Lebanon. It is all that Palestinians in Lebanon ask of Hezbollah, and to be true to their cause. Against this backdrop of Despondency and Cynicism one feels in the camps also a remarkable determination to Return to Palestine.
This observer observes a similar determination among a newer influx of Syrian refugees in Lebanon. Virtually every Syrian refugee I have encountered in Lebanon or elsewhere wants one thing: for the civil war in their country to end so that they can return to their beloved Syria.
The Lebanese politicians who regularly bleat about the Palestinian and Syrian refugees taking over this sinking country hide from their supporters the fact that few if any of these refugees, Syrian or Palestinian, want to remain in Lebanon one day longer than is absolutely necessary.
Palestinian families marching and remembering their loved ones murdered 34 years ago at Shatila camp, Beirut.
(Image by Franklin Lamb) Details DMCA
Full Return
As part of a deepening Determination to Return, a third Intifada is increasingly being discussed. But it will likely not be confined to occupied Palestinian territory, but rather will involve many of the 4 million Palestinians in the Diaspora, as well as their growing number of international supporters. It will be led by Palestinians themselves not the Arabs or international community who have mouthed some slogans and nodded but have done little if anything at all to advance a Full Return to Palestine.
The United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948, Article 13 affirms the human right of everyone to "leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country [ The United Nations ]." Furthermore, the United Nations General Assembly Resolution 194 states that all Palestinian "refugees wishing to return to their homes and live at peace with their neighbors should be permitted to do so at the earliest practicable date, and that compensation should be paid for the property of those choosing not to return [ United Nations Resolution 194 ]."
Thirty four years after the 1982 Massacre at Sabra-Shatila, the dream of Return to Palestine endures, and the struggle for Full Return shall never die. The dream will endure until Full Return and the victims of 34 years ago in Beirut, and all Palestinians martyred before and after the 1948 Nakba receive posthumous justice. Determination among Palestinians in Lebanon to Return exceeds their Despondency and Cynicism caused by injustice. Determination gives rise to hope for a better future.
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