Wakim Wakim
Secretary of the Committee of the Uprooted; refugee from Al-Bassa village.

Translation: Charles Kamen

Hello, and thank you to Zochrot for giving me the opportunity to speak in the name of the Committee of the Uprooted, an organization that protects the rights of the uprooted in .

Eitan mentioned a joke today.  I have another joke for him, which I’ll tell you.  Eitan sent me a working paper he and Norma wrote – I don’t know whether you received it – and I wondered after I read it (without being obsequious, I truly mean what I say) what anyone could add to that document.  It is a very daring document.  Our Committee is far from the point of trying to imagine how the country would look prior to, or after, the refugees’ return, but our friends at Zochrot are already confronting this problem.  We know that they are also dealing with many other problems whose importance shouldn’t be minimized, particularly the fears and apprehensions among Israeli Jews about even raising the issue of the Right of Return.  Although I don’t want to legitimize those fears, I believe – however paradoxical it may sound – that they should be addressed as seriously as we do the pain and suffering that the refugees have felt for decades.  It is no secret that this is a topic of dispute and discussion in all the organizations, especially at Zochrot.  I believe that it is entirely legitimate to consider ways of developing trust among people, because any plan, any project that would be proposed here or elsewhere regarding the question of the uprooted which is not completely frank in its approach, will ultimately fail.  And to whom should it be frank if not to those people whom we believe are victims no less than the Palestinians, the millions of Jews who are part of the Israeli experience.  No Israeli government, no Israeli establishment, will be able to separate us from each other, for better or worse.  The more the Israeli government is successful in removing this issue from the public agenda, the greater is our responsibility.  I commented – and I don’t know whether Eitan heard me – that I don’t think we have anything to add, and I honestly propose that the working paper be adopted.  It contains many ideas, and I’d like to address only a few points that were not mentioned, even negatively.

I am a member of the second Nakba generation, born in 1958.  It’s true I look older, but I was born in the village of Al-Bassa and now live in Mi’ilya, where Nada, the chair of today’s session, also lives.  She knows that I have a very lovely home.  I say this in all modesty, but my eyes are always turned to Al-Bassa.  Once or twice a week, on average, I visit Al-Bassa – the village where my father lived and was expelled from, the village on which Shlomi, the moshav of Betzet, and most recently, Shlomit was established. 

A year and a half ago, on a lovely summer day, a good friend called me to say, “I heard you want to return to Al-Bassa.  Listen, my cousin, from the family of X, is a contractor building at the Al-Bassa site. Why don’t you come to Shlomit, where you can have a nice house?”  “Are you serious?,” I asked.  “Yes,” he said, “I heard you wanted to return.  I’m telling you, I know the church, I know the mosque, and it’s about one hundred meters away.”  “You must have been given the wrong address,” I told him.  “Really, I don’t have any housing problems.” 

Of course, our situations are all relative.  From our perspective, we are people who have been uprooted – internal refugees.  We don’t have housing problems, we don’t live in refugee camps.  Even the “classic” refugee camps during the end of the 1940’s and the 1950’s one has heard about are not the same as those today – today’s are worse.  Today’s refugees have been cut off from their homeland for decades.  They have a connection to it that is not just a matter of nostalgia and a desire to recapture what once existed.  For me – it took me twelve years until I found 400 square meters of land on which to build a home.  Even then, I don’t feel connected to that land. Not that I don’t like my village, but I feel connected to Al-Bassa instead despite not having been born there. 

I often wonder and ask myself why I feel this way, despite not even being allowed to repair my grandfather’s tomb, despite being refused by the planning commission authorities to enter Al-Bassa. Given how I, as an internal refugee, already feel so strongly connected to my ancestral village, I can only imagine how much more strongly refugees in the refugee camps must feel.  Apart from daily difficulties, the refugees must struggle with their fragile existence in those camps and their uncertainty regarding whether or not they will be able to remain there.  Just to mention briefly the events of Black September in 1970 – there is no Arab regime whose hands are not covered with Palestinian blood; aside from the hands of and the Zionist movement, guilty regimes include  the Jordanians during Black September; the Syrian regime in 1976; during the civil war; today. 

Why do I mention this?  Because there is no future for Palestinians other than in the Palestinian homeland.  I say this in order to dispel the illusion created by some that after two or three generations, the nation will forget about the Right of Return.  This will not happen.  Subjective reasons include Palestinians’ personal connection and affinity with their homes; objective reasons include the conditions in which Palestinians currently live, etc. It is not possible.  No matter how much we emphasize this fact, and link it to our internal discourse, how relevant it seems. 

The present Israeli discourse about the Right of Return, as reflected in Israeli consciousness, represses the subject of “refugee-ness” and the Right of Return by presenting the Palestinians as victims; it accuses the citizens of and its institutions.  Every discussion of the Right of Return is like a sword held by the weaker party against the neck of the expropriator, the robber, the expeller, and who wants to find himself in that position?  Instead, why don’t we engage in a frank discussion with that mistaken population, the Jewish population of ?  Jointly examine the web of misinformation that has also turned them into a victim that pays a heavy price every day?  One who is not a refugee cannot truly feel, deep within himself, the supreme value of the Right of Return.  On the other hand, rather than discussing the right of Palestinians to return to their homeland, why not discuss the negative and destructive consequences of the failure to implement the right of Palestinians to return, given that the refugees comprise about 75% of the entire Palestinian population, and are the heart of the Israel-Palestine conflict?

Have Zionism and the state of kept their unequivocal promise to the Jewish people in of peace and security?  Or has the state itself unfortunately become one large ghetto which cannot be defended?  Can ’s numerical and military superiority guarantee the peace and security of the Israeli population in the long run?  What if the regional and international balance of force changes?  Will we be able to free ourselves of the illusion that the Palestinians will relinquish their right to return to their homeland, when the fact is that the refugee camps have been the source of all the Palestinian resistance movements and of its historical leadership?  As we have seen, they were not absorbed, either because of their own choice or by the decision of Arab regimes, which has even led to massacres, to which I have already referred.

Does all this not prove that the scope of resistance will only grow, not wane, despite the harsh battle currently wages against it on the West Bank and in Gaza ? Hasn’t it been sufficiently demonstrated that it is impossible to vanquish militarily Palestinians whose numbers include refugees?  New proof arrives every day that the source and heart of the conflict is the refugee-ness of the Palestinians.  Isn’t it about time that we learn from the hundred years of this region’s history, in which regimes that maintained themselves solely by virtue of military superiority only had limited reign?

If we’re interested in peace and security for coming generations, we must dramatically change our thinking and consciousness.  Which is better, to fight the entire Palestinian people for generations with varying degrees of success, or to try and reach an agreement that will guarantee the rights of everyone to this land?  Such an arrangement will recognize everyone’s connection to this land through constitutional means. A constitution based on the Universal Declaration of Human Rights will guarantee equal rights based on equal citizenship, will implement the refugees’ Right of Return, will separate religion from the state, and revise the legal system to finally be appropriate to the new situation. Clearly, one must discuss the various problems that will arise as a result, with the hope of redefining the groups as required by circumstances, emphasizing the right to new collective identities that cut across existing nationalities – this is your idea, Eitan.  Our challenge is to imagine the possibility of creating a new collective identity that transcends borders.

Do these difficult questions, of refugee-ness and the Right of Return, bring us back to the root of the conflict?  A solution that does not address the root of the conflict cannot be stable, just, or lasting.

Redemption depends on our ability to transform the issue of refugee-ness and the Return into one that concerns not only us, but also those who are blinded by ignorance and illusion, who are prevented from seeing the truth that will allow us to build our future and that of succeeding generations.  This requires us to initiate activities that will eventually lead to the conviction that allowing for the Right of Return is the only way to bring us all to a safe harbour.

We who are active in the Palestinian community face many questions, as do you who are active among Israeli Jews.  Should we limit our activities to Palestinians, or work with the Israeli population as well?  Should you, who are active among the Israeli population, be allowed to ignore the difficult issues raised in regarding refugee-ness and the Right of Return?  Can those “fears,” “doubts” and “apprehensions” be ignored?  Are they seen as sufficient justification for rejecting the idea of Return?  How can we dispel those fears?  If we see ourselves not only as academic researchers standing on the sidelines, but as people who must take the lead in bringing about a revolution in thinking and reduction in prejudice, then the rules of the game change, and we have a responsibility to respond to every counter-argument and contradictory opinion, to frankly present our view, to recognize what we have in common and emphasize our desire to live together on the basis of fairness, for only in this way can we insure peace and security for us all.

We must establish clear priorities, and present them in chronological order.  For example, it is impossible to present a detailed program before the Israeli establishment and its people have accepted the historical, legal and moral responsibility for what was done to the Palestinian people– massacre, mass expulsions, decades of denying the Right of Return, the historic and personal injustice involved.  Any other detailed program, like the one presented in the document entitled “Practical thoughts about the return of the Palestinian refugees,” is a consequence of what must precede it.  The same is true regarding the priorities set by the proposal.  For example, how easily it discusses the resettling of internal refugees, not as a way of postponing the return of refugees from beyond ’s borders but in consideration of the Israeli establishment’s concerns about the effect of the return on the country’s demographic structure. 

All groups working in the field, both Jewish and Arab, must conduct discussions and assign tasks and joint responsibilities among themselves, including specific tasks to each sector separately.  All activity must be conducted openly, though discourses may be adapted to the populations involved.  It is not the job of the Committee of the Displaced to convince the Jewish residents of a village whose former residents were expelled that we have a right to return. Nor is it solely Zochrot’s responsibility to convince the entire Israeli public of the justice of our demand – the demands of the displaced to return to the villages from which we were uprooted.  On the other hand, we must recognize our own historical responsibility, the difficulties we confront, along with the justice of our version, for our benefit and for that of succeeding generations. 

Our way is not clear, and our opponents outnumber our supporters, not only among Israelis but also among Palestinians. Even within the traditional Palestinian leadership, certain blocs place obstacles in our path when they cast doubt on the justice of our approach by falling into the trap set by the Israeli establishment that relinquishing the Right of Return is a condition for continuing negotiations toward an (imaginary) peace. The daring ideas raised in the paper Norma and Eitan wrote go far beyond the typical presentation of refugee-ness and the Right of Return, something that was necessary in view of the many questions raised over the years.  But as some questions are answered, others arise that demand frank responses from us all, and that demand that we transform these ideas into a program. 

We lack a joint “national” project. We cannot be satisfied with simply analyzing the questions and answers if we fail to place ourselves at the centre of the ongoing discussion, to define our role such that we revolutionize our thinking and consciousness.  The transition from the present cheerless reality to a promising future requires setting a clear and detailed course of action that will answer all the questions.  This is the responsibility of us all – not to describe history, but to create it.  Are we capable of undertaking this responsibility?  Indeed, do we have any alternatives, for ourselves and for succeeding generations?

Thank you