[Congressional Bills 118th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Res. 388 Introduced in House (IH)]
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118th CONGRESS
1st Session
H. RES. 388
Recognizing the ongoing Nakba and Palestine refugees rights.
_______________________________________________________________________
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
May 10, 2023
Ms. Tlaib (for herself, Ms. Omar, Ms. McCollum, Mr. Bowman, Ms. Ocasio-
Cortez, and Ms. Bush) submitted the following resolution; which was
referred to the Committee on Foreign Affairs
_______________________________________________________________________
RESOLUTION
Recognizing the ongoing Nakba and Palestine refugees rights.
Whereas May 15, 2023, is the 75th commemoration of the Palestinian Nakba,
meaning ``catastrophe'' in English, a term which refers to Israel's
uprooting, dispossession, and exile of the Palestinian people from their
homeland, and Israeli politicians are increasingly threatening
Palestinians with a second Nakba today;
Whereas the Nakba is the root cause of the issues that continue to divide Israel
and the Palestinian people today, and a just and lasting peace cannot be
established without addressing the Nakba and remedying its injustices
toward the Palestinian people;
Whereas the Nakba is not only a historical event, but also an ongoing process
characterized by Israel's separate-and-unequal laws and policies toward
Palestinians, including the destruction of Palestinian homes, the
construction and expansion of illegal settlements, and Israel's
confinement of Palestinians to ever-shrinking areas of land;
Whereas, during the Nakba, Israel forcibly exiled or caused to flee for their
lives under duress of military campaigns, which frequently included
massacres and other atrocities committed against civilians, at least
750,000 Palestinians (approximately 75 percent of the indigenous
population that had lived in areas that became Israel), who became
refugees;
Whereas, by 1949, Israel had depopulated and destroyed more than 400 Palestinian
villages and cities, often demolishing all homes and other buildings,
planting forests over them, or confiscating and expropriating
Palestinian property to give to Jewish Israelis;
Whereas the United States voted in favor of United Nations General Assembly
Resolution 194 on December 11, 1948, which states that Palestinian
``refugees wishing to return to their homes and live at peace with their
neighbours 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 and for loss of or damage to property which,
under principles of international law or in equity, should be made good
by the Governments or authorities responsible'';
Whereas Palestinian refugees right of return is not only stipulated in a General
Assembly resolution, but is also anchored in international law and in
Article 13 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which states
that, ``Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own,
and to return to his country.'';
Whereas, on December 8, 1949, the United Nations General Assembly adopted
Resolution 302 establishing the United Nations Relief and Works Agency
for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, which the United States has
financially supported on an almost continuous basis since its
establishment;
Whereas international law also recognizes that descendants of refugees retain
their rights as refugees, and that according to the United Nations,
``Palestine refugees are not distinct from other protracted refugee
situations such as those from Afghanistan or Somalia, where there are
multiple generations of refugees, considered by UNHCR as refugees and
supported as such. Protracted refugee situations are the result of the
failure to find political solutions to their underlying political
crises.'';
Whereas a just and lasting resolution to the Palestinian-Israeli issue requires
respect for and the implementation of Palestine refugee rights as
enshrined in United Nations General Assembly Resolution 194 and the
Universal Declaration of Human Rights;
Whereas the United States Congress enacted the Elie Wiesel Genocide and
Atrocities Prevention Act of 2018 (Public Law 115-441) mandating the
President to identify, monitor, and report on potential and ongoing
atrocities, and to develop policies and programs to improve the United
States response, and noting that it is the policy of the United States
to ``regard the prevention of atrocities as in its national interest'';
Whereas Israeli politicians are increasingly threatening a second Nakba against
the Palestinian people, as did, for instance, former Deputy Minister of
Religious Affairs Matan Kahan, who stated on June 14, 2022, ``If there
was a button that could be pressed and all the Arabs could disappear--
get on an express train to Switzerland, I would push it.'', and as did
Jerusalem city council member Yonatan Yosef, who led chants of, ``We
Want Nakba Now!'' during a provocative march through occupied
Palestinian East Jerusalem on January 13, 2023;
Whereas, on December 29, 2022, Israel formed its most extremist government to
date, which includes in its cabinet Bezalel Smotrich, who previously
stated to Palestinian citizens of Israel in Israel's parliament,
``You're here by mistake, it's a mistake that [Israeli Prime Minister
David] Ben-Gurion didn't finish the job and didn't throw you out in
1948.'';
Whereas, after Israeli settlers committed a pogrom in the Palestinian West Bank
village of Huwara on February 26, 2023, in which settlers killed one
Palestinian, injured more than 100 others, and set fire to hundreds of
houses, Smotrich also stated on March 1, 2023, that ``I think the
[Palestinian] village of Huwara needs to be wiped out. I think the State
of Israel should do it.'';
Whereas, since its formation, the current Israeli Government has intensified its
violent military rule over the Palestinian West Bank, has increased the
scope of its illegal settlements there, has taken steps to de jure annex
the Palestinian West Bank through the transfer of the Coordinator of
Government Activities in the Territories from military to civilian
responsibility, and has advanced legislation to undermine the
independence of Israel's judiciary; and
Whereas the United States is complicit in Israel's ongoing Nakba against the
Palestinian people by providing Israel with weapons and diplomatic
support even as it advances plans to destroy more Palestinian homes and
forcibly remove more Palestinians from their land in places such as
Sheikh Jarrah, Silwan, and Masafer Yatta, and is also currently
advancing plans to build a diplomatic facility in Jerusalem on land that
Israel expropriated from Palestinian refugees, including United States
citizens: Now, therefore, be it
Resolved, That it is the sense of the House of Representatives that
it is the policy of the United States to--
(1) commemorate the Nakba through official recognition and
remembrance;
(2) reject efforts to enlist, engage, or otherwise
associate the United States Government with denial of the
Nakba;
(3) encourage education and public understanding of the
facts of the Nakba, including the United States role in the
humanitarian relief effort and the relevance of the Nakba to
the modern-day refugee crises;
(4) continue to support the provision of social services to
Palestine refugees through the United Nations Relief and Works
Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East;
(5) support the implementation of Palestinian refugees'
rights as enshrined in United Nations General Assembly
Resolution 194 and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights;
(6) condemn all manifestations of Israel's ongoing Nakba
against the Palestinian people, including--
(A) Israel's illegal theft of Palestinian land in
the West Bank, including East Jerusalem;
(B) Israel's displacement of Palestinians by
destroying their homes and forcing them from their
land; and
(C) the daily brutality and violence inflicted by
the Israeli military and Israeli settlers against
Palestinian civilians;
(7) request from the President the application of the Elie
Wiesel Genocide and Atrocities Prevention Act of 2018 (Public
Law 115-441) to the treatment of Palestinians by Israel (both
state and nonstate actors), including--
(A) a report on the situation in the mandated
annual reporting to the Congress;
(B) training for United States Foreign Service
Officers stationed in the United States Embassy to
Israel per section 4 of such Act and section 4028(d) of
title 22, United States Code; and
(C) supporting and protecting Palestinian and
Israeli civil society groups and human rights defenders
working to monitor, document, prevent, and respond to
atrocities;
(8) denounce as incitement all threats, either implicit or
explicit, by Israeli politicians to commit a second Nakba, or
to finish what Israel began in 1948, or similar such
statements; and
(9) ensure the United States ends its complicity in
Israel's ongoing Nakba against the Palestinian people by--
(A) prohibiting United States weapons from being
used to destroy Palestinian homes and forcibly removing
Palestinians from their land;
(B) ending United States diplomatic support for
such actions; and
(C) refraining from building any diplomatic
facility on land expropriated by Israel from
Palestinian refugees, including United States citizens.
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