The Idea of an Essay, Volume 2

172 reasonable to infer, that these Arab countries should bear substantial responsibility for the settlement and aid of those Palestinians who fled Israel. The Arab nations’ responsibility extends to resettling the refugees, a solution once considered inevitable. In the 1950s, most authorities saw the solution of resettlement and integration, rejected now by most, as the probable outcome. Much of the arguments for and against the Palestinian’s right of return come from the UN General Assembly resolutions 194 and 394 (Romirowsky). These resolutions declared the need for “the reintegration of the refuges into the economic life of the Near East, either by repatriation or resettlement” (Joffe). As soon as 1951, the reintegration of Palestinians refugees “was understood in diplomatic circles exclusively as resettlement” (Joffe). The U.N. Secretary-General Trygve Lie’s hopewas that “refugees [would] lead an independent life in countries which have given them shelter” (Nachmias). Because of the poor economic statuses of Arab countries, the plan was to “offer the Arab governments vast resources” in exchange for integrating the refugees (Nachimas). Originally, “Arab states vehemently opposed resolution 194 and voted unanimously against it,” but many Arab countries quietly agreed to resettle Palestinian refugees with the incentive of western economic aid (Bartal). Unfortunately due to a combination of governments’ opposition, failure of funding to materialize, and a “misperception of the ultimate goals” these resettlement efforts did not solve the refugee problem (Nachimas). Despite the ultimate failure of these efforts, the fact that sixty years ago knowledgeable officials had accepted that Palestinians were not going to return to Israel supports resettlement as the most viable option. Additionally, resettlement is realistic because the population of Palestinians in need of resettlement is more manageable than various estimates would suggest. The UNRWA has repeatedly expandedthedefinitionof refugee tonowwhenit includesPalestinians “who lost both their homes and means of livelihood as a result of the 1948 Arab-Israeli conflict” and their descendants (Joffe). Under this definition, there are close to five million Palestinian refugees. This number fails to account for the integration of Palestinians in Arab societies. While the resettlement efforts of the 1950s overall unsuccessful, it did result in the “resettling hundreds of thousands