BADIL Resource Center for Palestinian Residency and Refugee

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Survey of Palestinian Refugees and Internally Displaced Persons (2006-2007)
Endnotes
1 Numbers for UNRWA registered refugees are correct as of 31 March 2007.
2 Palestine in Figures 2006, Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, Ramallah, 2007, p. 13.
3 The term “country of origin” as used here “is not limited to nationality in a formal sense, that is, nationality acquired at birth
or by conferral; it embraces, at the very least, an individual who, because of his or her special ties to or claims in relation to a
given country, cannot be considered to be a mere alien. This would be the case, for example, of nationals of a country who have
been stripped of their nationality in violation of international law, and of individuals whose country of nationality has been
incorporated in or transferred to another national entity, whose nationality is being denied them.” Human Rights Committee,
General Comment 27, Freedom of Movement (Article 12), UN Doc. CCPR/C/21/Rev.1/Add.9, 1999.
4 This figure is based on numerous sources. Israel revoked the residency rights of approximately 100,000 Palestinians from the
OPT between 1967 and 1991. See Quigley, John, “Family Reunion and the Right to Return to Occupied Territory,” Georgetown
Immigration Law Journal, 6, 1992.
According to the Jordanian government, some 7,000 Palestinians from the occupied West Bank were displaced to Jordan every
year between 1968 and 1988. See UN Doc. CERD/C/318/Add.1, 14 April 1998, Reports Submitted by States Parties under Article
9 of the Convention, Twelfth Periodic Report of States Parties due in 1997, Jordan, at para. 25 cited in Kossaifi, George F., The
Palestinian Refugees and the Right of Return, Washington, DC: The Center for Policy Analysis on Palestine, 1996, p. 8. Between
1969 and 1972, some 6,000 to 20,000 Bedouin farmers were evicted from the Rafah salient southwest of the occupied Gaza
Strip. Between 1968 and 1972, over 1,095 Palestinians were deported from the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip. Between
August 1985 and January 1988, some 46 Palestinians were expelled from the occupied Palestinian territory. From the beginning
of the first intifada in December 1987 until the end of 1989, 64 Palestinians were deported, with eight more deported in 1991.
On 16 December 1992, 413 Palestinians were deported. See Masalha, Nur, A Land without a People: Israel, Transfer and the
Palestinians, London: Faber & Faber Ltd, 1997. Moreover, the rate of out-migration is as high as 2% of the total population per
annum. See Pederson, Jon, Sara Randall and Marwan Khawaja (eds.), Growing Fast: the Palestinian Population in the West Bank
and Gaza Strip, Norway: FAFO Institute for Applied Social Science, 2001. The average rate of forced migration is estimated at
21,000 persons per year. See Kossaifi, George F., The Palestinian Refugees and the Right of Return, Washington, DC: The Center
for Policy Analysis on Palestine, 1996.
5 The definition of a Palestinian refugee used here is based on the 1951 UN Conciliation Commission for Palestine draft definition
of a Palestine refugee. See Addendum to Definition of a “Refugee”, para. 11 of General Assembly Resolution of 11 December 1948
(prepared by the Legal Advisor), UN Doc. W/61/Add.1, 29 May 1951.
6 Original registration was carried out by the International Committee of the Red Cross, the League of Red Crescent Societies
and (in the Gaza Strip) by the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC). During 1950–51, UNRWA carried out a census in
all areas of operations, excluding the Gaza Strip, where it relied on AFSC records. UNRWA registration includes an individual
registration number, a family registration number, and a family code that links the computerized demographic data in the family
registration number sheet with the non-computerized data in the family files. The latter includes birth, marriage, and death
certificates and a limited number of property deeds. For more information, see Reinterpreting the Historical Record: The Uses of
Palestinian Refugee Archives for Social Science Research and Policy Analysis, Tamari, Salim and Zureik, Elia (eds.). Jerusalem: Institute
for Jerusalem Studies, 2001.
7 “[Palestine refugee] shall mean any person whose normal place of residence was Palestine during the period 1 June 1946 to 15
May 1948 and who lost both home and means of livelihood as a result of the 1948 conflict.” Consolidated Registration Instructions
(CRI), 1 January 1993, para. 2.13; see also Annex 2.
8 Public information office, UNRWA Headquarters, Gaza, September 2006: http://www.un.org/unrwa/publications/index.html.
9 Some 82,000 persons were removed from the registration record in 1950 and 1951. See Takkenberg, Lex, The Status of Palestinian
Refugees in International Law, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1998, p. 70.
10 Report of the Commissioner-General of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, 1 January–31
December 2005, UN GA, Supp. 13 (A/61/13), p. 20.
11 For an overview of the development of the UNRWA definition of a Palestine refugee, see Takkenberg, Lex, The Status of Palestinian
Refugees, pp. 68–83.
12 UNGA Resolution 37/120 (I), 16 December 1982. Report of the Secretary-General, 12 September 1983, UN Doc. A/38/382.
13 Annual Report of the Director of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, 1 July 1951–30
June 1952. UN GAOR, 7 th Sess., Supp. 13 (A/2171), 30 June 1952, para. 8. Initial registration files for these internally displaced
Palestinians include six boxes consisting of 11,304 family cards and 5,155 correction cards. Each card contains details such as
names, age, sex, occupation, past addresses and the “distribution center” to which the family was attached. UNRWA refers to
these files as “dead” files. Reinterpreting the Historical Record: The Uses of Palestinian Refugee Archives for Social Science Research and
Policy Analysis, Tamari, Salim and Zureik, Elia (eds.). Jerusalem: Institute for Jerusalem Studies, 2001, p. 45. UNRWA records