Rezümékötet 2008. - vmtdk

T Á R S A D A L O M T U D O M Á N Y O K
SELF-DETERMINATION IN THE PALESTINIAN CONTEXT
Author: Imola SÖRÖS final year student
Supervisor: Tibor VARADY PhD, university professor
Institution: Faculty of Law, University of Novi Sad
Hungarian College for Higher Education in Vojvodina
Much of the current political instability in the Middle East origins from the conflict between Israeli Jews and Palestinian
Arabs. At issue is a struggle over territory, each group claiming possession of the region traditionally known
as Palestine. The West is familiar with the vision of Palestine as a „promised” land with which Jews have maintained an
association for over 3000 years, though Jews governed no portion of it from the time of the Roman conquest in 65
B.C. till 1948 when, through the success of the Zionist movement, the state of Israel was established.
Events surrounding the creation of the State of Israel in 1948 have made of Palestinian refugees one of the world’s
largest and oldest refugee population, with estimates ranging over 4 million refugees among a global refugee population
of 9.2 million. Since their initial flight from their homes in Palestine and subsequently from Israel in 1948-1949, Palestinians
have undergone successive waves of displacement and their status continues to be very difficult and peculiar.
During the hostilities of 1948 in Palestine, over 90% of the Arabs were expelled from the territory that the Jewish
Agency and Israel took under its control. As reaction, in 1964 a new political movement called the Palestine Liberation
Organisation (PLO) was founded. Fatah has been the predominant element in the Palestinian politics since the
beginning. The PLO, from the time of its founding, took the position that the predominantly Arab population of Palestine
was entitled to exercise self-determination on the whole territory of the former Palestine. Later, however, the
PLO modified its position and declared instead an aim of effectuating the right of self-determination in a portion
only of the territory of the historic Palestine, namely the Gaza Strip and the West Bank of the Jordan river.
By the 1970s, the UN General Assembly was regarding the Palestine Arabs as entitled to self-determination. But it
still remained unclear whether the right was individual, to be exercised by a particular displaced person, or a collective.
In addition, the recognition of the right of self-determination led to confusion over the identity of the territory in
which the right was to be exercised, since self-determination has meaning only if it relates to territory.
The debate over self-determination as applied to the territory of the historic Palestine took turn in 2006, when
Palestinian voters in the Gaza Strip and West Bank elected a parliamentary assembly in which a majority was held by
the Hamas organization. Hamas proclaimed the right of Palestinians to self-determination in the entirety of the territory
of the historic Palestine. This political turn gave new importance to the question of self-determination in regard
to that territory.
The aim of this paper is to highlight the right of self-determination and repatriation in the Palestinian context.
Keywords: Palestine, Israel, PLO, self-determination, repatriation
N Y O S D I Á K K Ö R I K O N F E R E N C I A
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