'Hamas is in contact with most foreign countries'

[shira]

WASHINGTON – A senior UNRWA official broached two largely taboo topics at a conference here on Friday, saying governments across Europe and the world have had contacts with Hamas and that Palestinian refugees should acknowledge that they will almost certainly not be returning to Israel.

Andrew Whitley, due to soon leave his post as director of the United Nations Refugee and Works Agency’s New York office, told the National Council for US-Arab Relations’ annual conference that contacts with Hamas were commonplace.

<snip>

Whitley also said that Palestinians must start acknowledging that the refugees will almost certainly not be returning to Israel, so that they can improve their situation. Palestinians have long maintained a “right of return” to Israel and the homes they – or their ancestors – fled during Israel’s 1948/49 War of Independence. The issue has been one of the most difficult to resolve in peace negotiations.

“If one doesn’t start a discussion soon with the refugees for them to consider what their own future might be – for them to start debating their own role in the societies where they are rather than being left in a state of limbo where they are helpless but preserve rather the cruel illusions that perhaps they will return one day to their homes – then we are storing up trouble for ourselves,” he declared.

more...
http://www.jpost.com/International/Article.aspx?id=192485

[shira]

1. Interesting talkbacks on article...

somebody finally tells the 'Palestinians' to WAKE UP! No, there is no going back. There never was, but your pathetic, lying 'leaders' jerked you around like donkeys on a yoke while they fed at the trough of international aid and made themselves rich like kings. Go ask your 'leaders' why your lives suck. They'll blame Israel, of course. But it's not Israel. Your dear Arab brothers have kept you right where they want you. Think about that.

I'd probably disagree with Whitley on 90% of the issues out there, but at least the guy is willing to be honest about the fact that the refugees will never return to Israel. In fact, unlike those parroting the fantasy that the refugees will be settled, this guy is showing some compassion, preparing these Arabs to start thinking about building their lives where they live. Ironically, were 10,000 Palestinians to return to Tel Aviv, they'd most likely be miserable, as they'd be competing with such an overeducated, modern, tech-savvy population. Would they really WANT to return?

These are the real conversations that need to be taking place. The UNRWA has had a major role in sustaining, and to an extent creating, probably the most important real issue--refugees. Jerks like Jimmy Carter and most of the world press seem to think concentrating on Israeli "settlements" is the solution; how about actually tendering to the people they claim to want to help?

[shira]

2. UNRWA distances itself from the statements of its New York Director

UNRWA unequivocally distances itself from the statements made by the Director of its office in New York, Andrew Whitley, at the National Council on U.S.-Arab Relations in Washington on 22 October 2010. These statements in no way reflect the policies or positions of the Agency and are the personal views of Mr Whitley.

http://unrwa.org/etemplate.php?id=831

:eyes:

[ProgressiveProfessor]

3. Going to be hell to pay on Monday

[shira]

4. Powerful Anti-Israel Lobby silences Andrew Whitley of UNRWA for politically incorrect remarks

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ben-s-cohen/unrwa-shames-andrew-whitl_b_779370.html

Whitley's candor has cost him his job and, it would seem, his dignity too. Angrily criticized by everyone from Hamas to the Jordanian government, Whitley was compelled to recant in a letter to UNRWA's spokesman, Christopher Gunness. His tone is so supine and humble that the reader is bound to wonder if these words are actually Whitley's, or whether they were authored, in the manner of the KGB, by someone else. "I express my sincere regrets and apologies over any harm that my words may have done to the cause of the Palestine refugees and for any offence I may have caused," the letter says. It ends thus: "The Agency is at liberty to use my statement in whatever ways it sees fit. There is no need for a reply."

Had the "Israel Lobby" secured such a mournful repudiation of the right to independent thought from a critic of Israeli policy, the chorus of "I-told-you-so" would raise the roof. But there have been no accusations of "censorship" or "muzzling" or "McCarthyism" around Whitley's fate. Indeed, Chris Gunness - someone I have known professionally, and who always struck me as a decent liberal sort - apparently has no difficulty in playing the role of father confessor to the irredeemably deviant Whitley.

UNRWA, it needs to be said, did not emasculate Whitley without external pressure. In addition to Arab governments (none of whom, incidentally, are included among UNRWA's top twenty donor nations) and Islamist terrorists, western groups like Al Awda - which bills itself as "The Palestine Right to Return Coalition" from an address in California - were also baying for Whitley's blood. Al Awda, whose supporters have been known to chant charming epithets such as "Jews Are Our Dogs," is triumphantly displaying an email from UNRWA's Sami Mshasha gratefully recognizing the organization's role in securing Whitley's apologia.