The State Department has officially recognized more than 5 million Palestinian refugees, a startling policy shift that jeopardizes the future of the Israeli Palestinian peace process.
Foreign Policy’s Josh Rogin reports:
The U.S. government considers the descendants of Palestinian refugees to be refugees, a State Department official told The Cable, and another top State Department official wrote in a letter to Congress that there are now 5 million Palestinian refugees.
Rogin’s revelation comes on the heels of a hotly contested Senate amendment aimed at finding exactly how many Palestinian refugees are benefiting from U.S. tax dollars. It would require the State Department to report on how many Palestinian refugees actually lived in Palestine from 1946-1948 and were displaced by the regional conflict and how many are descendants of these persons.
Rogin highlights a letter from Deputy Secretary of State Tom Nides opposing the amendment:
But later down in the letter, Nides states, "UNRWA provides essential services for approximatelyfive million refugees, including education for over 485,000 school children, primary health care in 138 clinics, and social services for the most Vulnerable, particularly in Lebanon and Gaza." (Emphasis added.)
To experts and congressional officials following the issue, that declaration was remarkable because it was the first time the State Department had placed a number -- 5 million -- on the number of Palestinian refugees.
"The Nides letter could be considered a change in U.S. policy with consideration to refugees because it states clearly that 5 million people served by UNRWA are refugees," one senior GOP Senate aide told The Cable. "For the Obama administration to stake out a position emphatically endorsing the rights of 5 million Palestinian refugees is by itself prejudging the outcome of final- status issues."