Palestinians mark 68 years for al-Nakba Day, insist on right of return

The Palestinians all over the world and in the Palestinian territories in particular marked on Sunday 68 years for al-Nakba (Catastrophe) Day, or the day when the state of Israel was created, where they insisted on the right of return to their homes in their towns and villages.

Sirens were launched for 68 seconds at 12 midday in most of the cities and Palestinian refugee camps in the West Bank to declare launching the popular and official activities to revive the anniversary. As sirens were on for 68 seconds, dozens of Palestinians rallied allover the West Bank and Gaza areas.

In the rallies, hundreds of Palestinians demonstrated as they waved Palestinian flags and held banners with written slogans insisting the Palestinians will never make concessions on the Palestinians right of return. During the rallies, several music bands and artists played music and sang national songs.

In the West Bank city of Ramallah, a procession of ancient vehicles carrying aged Palestinian male and female refugees; a symbolic scene from the history as if the refugees are riding these vehicles and going back to their homes in their towns and villages that have become now part of Israel.

Mohamed Olayan, the coordinator of the committee to revive the activities for marking al-Nakba Day, told Xinhua that the rallies were organized to reiterate that the Palestinians insist on gaining their right of return and compensating them for 68 years of suffering and displacement.

"These activities are a clear message to Israel that it will never succeed in erasing or annulling the right of return and that all its practices of crimes and violations against the Palestinian people will never force our people to drop this legitimate right," said Olayan.

In al-Deheisha Refugee Camp south of the West Bank city of Bethlehem, near Hebron, a symbolic train made of woods and steal drove through the refugee camp and the villages around. The symbolic train stopped at an Israeli army roadblock in the outskirts of Bethlehem.

The train was called "Train of Return" and it was organized by the International Network for refugees in cooperation with the Palestinian Committee for Popular Resistance. The train consisted of four carts placed on wheels and graffiti written on the carts called for the right of return.

Eyewitnesses said that an Israeli army force fired tear gas at the train and the participants and dispersed them by force. Monther Amira, member of the International Network for Refugees told Xinhua that the idea of the train imitates the principle of the right of return.

On the train's front, the number 194 was written on it in reference to the United Nations resolution 194 that called for the return of Palestinian refugees to their homes in their towns and villages and that they have to be compensated for loosing their properties.

In Gaza City, dozens of Palestinians joined a rally held at the square of the Unknown Solider in Gaza City's downtown to mark the anniversary of the Palestinian al-Nakba. The participants waved Palestinian flags and held little banners on each banner the name of a Palestinian town was written.

"The right of return for the Palestinians is a legal right and this rally sends a message to the world that the Palestinian people are sticking to this right," said Zakareya al-Agha, the refugees commissioner in Palestine Liberation Organization, adding "the Palestinian people can't be broken."

Meanwhile, Islamic Hamas movement, which has been ruling the Gaza Strip since it had violently seized control of it in 2007, said that it will never recognize the state of Israel, adding that "armed resistance is the only way to liberate the occupied lands of Palestine."

The movement said in an emailed press statement that the Arab states should stop controlling the Palestinian refugees and stop also putting them into more displacement allover the world.

The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) said in a statement that the Palestinian people are sticking to their legitimate rights and sticking to their unity allover the world, adding "the Palestinians reject all the attempts to displace the refugees and erase their legitimate rights, mainly the right of return.

The Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics said in a recent statistic on the anniversary of al-Nakba that the number of Palestinian refugees climbed to 5,590,000 people, where 28.7 percent of them live in poor and miserable refugee camps in Gaza, West Bank, Syria, Lebanon and Jordan.

(APD)