For those of you in the L.A. area, something to look forward to. I guess you had peace for too long, the US Department needs a little "action" in L.A. Why should antisemitic attacks occur only on the East Coast???

Welcome to Los Angeles: this is the population you can be looking forward to have as neighbors; see this little video clip to give you an idea.

US to resettle 1,350 Iraqi-Palestinian refugees

Jul. 9, 2009
JPost.com Staff , THE JERUSALEM POST

The US State Department confirmed Tuesday that as many as 1,350 Iraqi Palestinians - once well-treated guests of Saddam Hussein and now estranged from Iraqi society - will be resettled in the US, mostly in southern California, starting this fall, the Christian Science Monitor reported.

It will be the largest-ever resettlement of Palestinian refugees into the US - and welcome news to the Palestinians who fled to Iraq after 1948, but who have had a tough time since Hussein was ousted in 2003. Targeted by Iraqi Shi'ites, the Palestinians, mostly Sunni Muslims, have spent recent years in one of the region's roughest refugee camps, Al Waleed, near Iraq's border with Syria in the west.

"Really for the first time, the United States is recognizing a Palestinian refugee population that could be admitted to the US as part of a resettlement program," Bill Frelick, refugee policy director at Human Rights Watch in Washington told CSM.

Considering that the US in the past was reluctant to resettle Palestinians - only seven were accepted in 2007 and only nine in 2008 - the effort could become a point of contention between Israel and the US.

For many in the State Department and international community, the resettlement is part of a moral imperative the US has to clean up the refugee crisis created by invading Iraq. The US has already stepped up resettlement of Iraqis, some whom have struggled to adjust to life in America.

The resettlement of Iraqi Palestinians is "an important gesture for the United States to demonstrate that we're not heartless," Alon Ben-Meir, a professor of international relations and Middle Eastern studies at New York University told the publication.

But some critics say the State Department is sloughing off its problems onto American cities, especially since in this case the Palestinians were sympathizers of the Iraqi tyrant.

"This is politically a real hot potato," said Mark Krikorian, director of the conservative Center for Immigration Studies in Washington, adding, "America has become a dumping ground for the State Department's problems - they're tossing their problems over their head into Harrisburg, Pa., or Omaha, Neb."

Palestinian refugees came to Iraq in successive waves over several decades, first in 1948, then in 1967, and in 1991. They were treated well under Hussein but were also used to attack Israeli policies, and their presence was resented by many locals.

After Hussein was removed from power in 2003, many of these Palestinians were driven out of their homes and now live "at the mercy of the weather" in rough camps along the Syrian and Jordanian border, said Mr. Ben-Meir. The number of Palestinians in Iraq has fallen from around 34,000 to an estimated 15,000, with about 2,773 living in camps, according to the State Department.

The US, which takes in about 80,000 refugees annually, hopes to bring 17,000 Iraqi refugees this year.

While the US generally doesn't accept Palestinians, Todd Pierce, a spokesman for the State Department's Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration, said that the Iraqi population of Palestinians falls under a different category from those in Gaza and the West Bank. Each applicant will be carefully scrutinized for terrorist ties, he added.

The US reluctance to accept Palestinians is because it "doesn't want the refugee program to become an issue in its relationship with Israel," said a diplomat in the region on condition of remaining anonymous. But these Palestinians, he said, would be processed as refugees from Iraq.

Mr. Krikorian said the US should be the last refuge for those fleeing persecution. Only Jordan of all the Arab countries routinely grants citizenship to Palestinian refugees, he noted. More recently, said Mr. Frelick, Jordan has also shut its borders to Palestinians coming from Iraq.

Frelick, who has visited a camp on the Jordanian border, said the Iraqi Palestinians were "apolitical," and "basically desperate, scared, miserable, and ready to just get out of Iraq."

So after being kicked out of Baghdad for being who they are , this is where they ended up - a fitting place for such horrible people:

According to the UNHCR, an estimated 1,400 Palestinians are living in desperate conditions in refugee camps along the Iraq-Syria border, unable to cross into a country already straining to cope with hundreds of thousands of Iraqi and Palestinian refugees.

A steady flow of Palestinians have fled Baghdad since March 2006, when intimidation, forced evictions and attacks against their community began mounting.

Syria let a first group cross the border and settle at al-Hol refugee camp in the al-Hassekeh governorate in May last year. A second group was stranded at al-Tanf refugee camp, but those currently fleeing Baghdad can no longer access al-Tanf, home to 389 Palestinians.

Today, Palestinians fleeing Baghdad for the Syrian border have nowhere to go but al-Waleed, which lacks the infrastructure to support them.


Comments:

SHmuel said:

Congratulations LA!

DS added:

Also, do not forget that the definition of TERRORISM is highly elastic, specially at the hands of an anti-semitic, anti-Israel State Department, and a Muslim president. For all we know, terror might be defined as 'violent actions against Muslims'. So this so-called screening is 'a smokescreen'!

Wikipedia:

Main article: Definition of terrorism
See also: State terrorism

"Terror" comes from a Latin word meaning "to frighten". The terror cimbricus was a panic and state of emergency in Rome in response to the approach of warriors of the Cimbri tribe in 105BC. The Jacobins cited this precedent when imposing a Reign of Terror during the French Revolution. After the Jacobins lost power, the word "terrorist" became a term of abuse. Although the Reign of Terror was imposed by a government, in modern times "terrorism" usually refers to the killing of innocent people by a private group in such a way as to create a media spectacle. This meaning can be traced back to Sergey Nechayev, who described himself as a "terrorist".[9] Nechayev founded the Russian terrorist group "People's Retribution" (Народная расправа) in 1869.

In November 2004, a United Nations Security Council report described terrorism as any act "intended to cause death or serious bodily harm to civilians or non-combatants with the purpose of intimidating a population or compelling a government or an international organization to do or abstain from doing any act". (Note that this report does not constitute international law).[10]

In many countries, acts of terrorism are legally distinguished from criminal acts done for other purposes, and "terrorism" is defined by statute; see definition of terrorism for particular definitions. Common principles among legal definitions of terrorism provide an emerging consensus as to meaning and also foster cooperation between law enforcement personnel in different countries. Among these definitions there are several that do not recognize the possibility of legitimate use of violence by civilians against an invader in an occupied country and would, thus label all resistance movements as terrorist groups. Others make a distinction between lawful and unlawful use of violence. Ultimately, the distinction is a political judgment.[11]
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