Just the Facts: The Ongoing Nakba

  • Between 100,000 and 150,000 Palestinians were displaced under the Mandate, roughly a million were displaced in the Nakba, and another 400,000 to 450,000 were displaced in 1967.
  • In Jerusalem alone, more than 14,000 Palestinians have lost their residency status and right to live in East Jerusalem since 1967.
  • Between 2008 and 2012, 97.7 percent of building permit applications in Area C submitted by Palestinians were rejected by the Israeli authorities.
  • Israel has confiscated or de facto annexed more than 3,456 km² (61 percent) of the West Bank (including East Jerusalem) for the exclusive benefit of Jewish colonizers.
  • Since 1948, Palestinian refugees are denied their right to return and citizenship, in opposition to U.N. General Assembly Resolution 194, which resolves that the refugees should be allowed to return to their homes or be compensated.
  • After 1948 Israel continued to confiscate land, often declaring it “state land”, so that by 1962, 93% of the land inside Israel was controlled by the Israel Lands Administration, while Palestinian citizens only owned 4% of the total.
  • Today, Jews control over 85% of the land of historic Palestine (compared to 6.2% during the British Mandate).
  • Since 1967, Palestinians have lost access to over 60% of West Bank land and two thirds of its grazing land, while over 2.5 million productive trees have been uprooted.
  • In Gaza half of the cultivable area has been lost.
  • Israel has destroyed over 27,000 Palestinian homes and structures.
  • Israel has established 131 illegal settlements and over 100 outposts on Palestinian soil.
  • Over 600,000 Jews have been transferred to settle in Palestinian territories,
  • Residency rights have been stripped from over 100,000 residents of Gaza, some 140,000 residents of the West Bank, and over 14,500 Palestinian Jerusalemites.
  • Nearly one-third of the registered Palestine refugees, more than 1.5 million individuals, live in 58 recognized Palestine refugee camps in Jordan, Lebanon, the Syrian Arab Republic, the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem.

This week’s Just the Facts comes from:

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