UNRWA Commemorates World Refugee Day

In light of the recent deaths of young children on Gaza beach and in the Sheikh Radwan neighborhood in the Gaza Strip, UNRWA’s commemoration of World Refugee Day on 20 June 2006 is especially sobering. Marked globally since 2001, World Refugee Day was established by a United Nations General Assembly Resolution in 2000. To date, the Day has been celebrated annually by the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR), with events focused on refugees in Africa and elsewhere in the world. However, as UNHCR’s mandate does not extend to Palestine refugees, they were not included in the commemorative events.

For many years, ceremonies were held in UNRWA schools to mark the day. This year, UNRWA decided to commemorate the date in a larger and more public way, so that people will know World Refugee Day commemorates all refugees, wherever they are in the world. Falling during the 56^th year of operations of both UNRWA and UNHCR, World Refugee Day 2006 pays tribute to the resilience of spirit of refugees the world over who have been forced to leave their homes and endure tremendous suffering.

In the words of UNRWA Commissioner-General Karen AbuZayd, "World Refugee Day should be a day when we make a pledge to the refugee children of Palestine. A pledge that we will do what we can to keep hope alive." In this spirit, the plight of Palestine refugee children in the Gaza Strip served as the theme of UNRWA’s commemoration of World Refugee Day through the Agency’s hosting of public events in East Jerusalem at Al Hoash art gallery and the Palestinian National Theatre, Al Hakawati. An UNRWA photo exhibition was unveiled at the gallery, featuring photos of Palestine refugee children from the Agency’s five fields. Entitled ‘All I Have’ the exhibition shares its name with a poem by the renowned Palestinian poet and former Knesset member, the late Tawfiq Zayyad. Contemporary photos of "kids just being kids" – playing on the beach, eating ice cream, dancing – are coupled alongside somber black and white UNRWA archival photos depicting exodus and homelessness.

About 300 people attended the exhibition and other events. At Al Hakawati, the evening opened with an address by AbuZayd and the UN Secretary-General’s speech delivered by Alvaro de Soto, Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process. Testimonies on the hardships facing Gazan children were given by experts from OCHA, WHO and WFP. To compensate for the fact that Palestine refugee children from Gaza could not be present and speak for themselves, two refugee children, teenage girls from Shufat refugee camp, read Zayyad’s poem.

In addition, refugee children were present in two new documentary videos which examined the widespread poverty plaguing the lives of child and adult refugees in the Gaza Strip. Such endemic poverty causes hunger and nutritional problems amongst children; add to this violence in the form of unexploded ordinance, shells, artillery and intra-Palestinian fighting. The evening ended with the screening of two UNRWA films, ‘Hoda’s Story’ and ‘Mother Aysha.’ UNRWA hopes that by raising awareness of the problems facing refugee children in Gaza, more effort will be made to ensure that their rights are respected and protected.

There are Palestine refugees in all of UNRWA’s five fields of operation: the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon. There are also many Palestine refugees living abroad, in the Palestinian Diaspora. Though Agency services are accessible only to registered Palestine refugees living in the five fields, UNRWA salutes the strength and self-reliance of Palestine refugees everywhere and pays special tribute to refugee children in the Gaza Strip this World Refugee Day.