Coveted Refugee Status Bequeathed To Children

Yarmouk Refugee Camp, Syria, November 16 – A resident of this embattled neighborhood of Damascus died at the hands of an insurgent sniper this morning, leaving his four children the envy of millions of other refugees worldwide. Whereas the refugees from other conflicts are absorbed by various countries as citizens, the refugees from the various Palestine conflicts enjoy the unparalleled privilege of passing down their refugee status in perpetuity, never having to relinquish their enviable, stateless position.

Samr Abu Ramzi, 36, ventured into the rainy alleys of the camp after daybreak, hoping to find the smuggler with whom he had planned a rendezvous, to secure a few days’ worth of onions, flour, perhaps some toilet paper. But the unexpectedly plentiful rain had made the dirt alleyways impassably muddy, and Abu Ramzi was forced out into the open, where a gunman felled him with a single shot to the chest. The Abu Ramzis will go hungry, but they, like their father, will remain under the auspices of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees, or UNRWA, which is charged with keeping the Palestinian refugees of the 1948 and 1967 wars and their descendants cared for until their situation can be resolved, rescuing them from the terrifying prospect of becoming citizens with full rights in some other country.

UNRWA lies outside the scope of all other refugee-related activity of the United Nations, which for other refugees concentrates on finding countries willing to absorb those fleeing a conflict, a fate that has thankfully spared those under UNRWA’s aegis. Palestine refugees enjoy living conditions that other refugees experience only temporarily until they are summarily granted asylum and protection by a stable, welcoming entity. The millions of registered Palestine refugees are free of the concerns facing people with actual citizenship and rights, including the daunting prospect of a job market that allows their participation, or the decisions that arise when one has freedom of movement.

Whereas typical refugees are pressured into relinquishing their refugee status with offers of suffrage, rule of law, and lack of persecution, no such inducements force Palestine refugees into accepting asylum, an acceptance that would imply they will settle for anything other than the destruction of Israel as the permanent resolution of their stateless status. As such, Palestine refugee camps suffer from none of the headaches associated with the construction of new dwellings, or even proper additions to existing facilities: it would be too complicated and uncomfortable to explain how such development does not constitute acceptance of Israel and the status quo.

The Abu Ramzi family shares a single room with another family of six in a dank, concrete box of a building with tin roofs and the constant aroma of human waste, an experience that few other refugees are allowed to have for prolonged periods. The oldest surviving child, Falestin, 16, now has the opportunity to advance to her father’s role as chief breadwinner, as the going rate for a loaf of bread in Yarmouk is currently holding steady at two tricks.