[Congressional Bills 119th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Res. 409 Introduced in House (IH)]
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119th CONGRESS
1st Session
H. RES. 409
Recognizing the ongoing Nakba and Palestinian refugees' rights.
_______________________________________________________________________
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
May 14, 2025
Ms. Tlaib (for herself, Ms. Lee of Pennsylvania, Ms. Omar, Ms. Simon,
Ms. Ocasio-Cortez, Mrs. Watson Coleman, Ms. Pressley, Mrs. Ramirez, and
Mr. Carson) submitted the following resolution; which was referred to
the Committee on Foreign Affairs
_______________________________________________________________________
RESOLUTION
Recognizing the ongoing Nakba and Palestinian refugees' rights.
Whereas May 15, 2025, is the 77th commemoration of the Palestinian Nakba,
meaning ``catastrophe'' in English, a term which refers to Israel's
uprooting, dispossession, and exile of the Palestinian people from their
homeland;
Whereas the United Nations General Assembly recommended on November 29, 1947, to
partition Palestine into two States against the wishes of Palestine's
majority indigenous inhabitants;
Whereas, almost immediately following the passage of the United Nations
partition plan, Zionist militias began a deliberate and systematic
effort to expel Palestinians from their lands, a campaign which included
massacres and other atrocities against civilian populations;
Whereas, before the State of Israel declared its independence on May 14, 1948,
between 250,000 to 300,000 Palestinian refugees had already been
forcibly expelled or fled from their homes, often following attacks by
Zionist militias on major Palestinian cities and villages;
Whereas, by the time of the signing of armistice agreements between Israel and
neighboring Arab countries in 1949, the new State of Israel had
established control over 78 percent of Palestine and, in the process,
conquered an additional 23 percent of Palestine beyond those areas
allocated to the Jewish State under the partition plan;
Whereas, by the time of the 1949 armistice, Zionist militias and the new Israeli
army had expelled at least 750,000 Palestinians, roughly 75 percent of
the entire indigenous Palestinian population, from their homes in areas
that became the State of Israel, becoming refugees living in exile;
Whereas, by 1949, Israel had depopulated more than 400 Palestinian villages and
cities, often demolishing all homes and other structures and planting
forests over them;
Whereas the United States knew of the scale and magnitude of the Palestinian
refugee crisis as it unfolded, as is documented in an October 1948
telegram to the President and Secretary of State from the Embassy of the
United States to Israel, warning that the ``Arab Refugee tragedy is
rapidly reaching catastrophic proportions and should be treated as a
disaster'';
Whereas the United States voted in favor of United Nations General Assembly
Resolution 194 on December 11, 1948, which states that Palestinian
``refugees wishing to return to their homes and live at peace with their
neighbors should be permitted to do so at the earliest practicable date,
and that compensation should be paid for the property of those choosing
not to return and for loss of or damage to property which, under
principles of international law or in equity, should be made good by the
governments or authorities responsible'';
Whereas Palestinian refugees' right of return is not only stipulated in a
General Assembly resolution, but is also anchored in international law
and in Article 13 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which
states: ``Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his
own, and to return to his country'';
Whereas, on December 8, 1949, the United Nations General Assembly adopted
Resolution 302 establishing the United Nations Relief and Works Agency
for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, which the United States has
financially supported on an almost continuous basis since its
establishment;
Whereas, of the more than 7,000,000 Palestinian refugees, the United Nations
Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East provides
much-needed social services to 5,900,000 Palestine refugees today;
Whereas international law also recognizes that descendants of refugees retain
their rights as refugees, and that according to the United Nations,
``Palestine refugees are not distinct from other protracted refugee
situations such as those from Afghanistan or Somalia, where there are
multiple generations of refugees, considered by UNHCR as refugees and
supported as such. Protracted refugee situations are the result of the
failure to find political solutions to their underlying political
crises.'';
Whereas the Nakba refers not only to a historical event but to an ongoing
process of Israel's expropriation of Palestinian land and its
dispossession of the Palestinian people that continues to this day,
including the systematic destruction of Palestinian homes, the
construction and expansion of illegal settlements, and the confinement
of Palestinians to ever-shrinking areas of land;
Whereas the apartheid Government of Israel is committing a genocide against the
Palestinian people which, as of April 9, 2025, has--
(1) killed at least 50,810 people, including more than 15,600 children,
with over 14,000 more still missing and presumed dead under the rubble;
(2) wounded more than 115,688;
(3) displaced over 1,900,000; and
(4) engineered a state of famine across Gaza;
Whereas the establishment and expansion of hundreds of illegal settlements and
outposts in the occupied Palestinian West Bank in which approximately
737,000 Israelis reside as of 2023 is another form of ethnic cleaning
used to perpetuate the Nakba;
Whereas the United States is complicit in Israel's ongoing Nakba against the
Palestinian people by providing Israel with weapons and diplomatic
support even as its leaders openly announce and carry out plans to
ethnically cleanse and depopulate Palestinian communities today; and
Whereas a just and lasting resolution requires respect for and the
implementation of Palestine refugee rights as enshrined in United
Nations General Assembly Resolution 194 and the Universal Declaration of
Human Rights: Now, therefore, be it
Resolved, That it is the sense of the House of Representatives that
it is the policy of the United States to--
(1) commemorate the Nakba through official recognition and
remembrance;
(2) denounce the ongoing Nakba of the Palestinian people;
(3) reject efforts to enlist, engage, or otherwise
associate the United States Government with denial of the
Nakba;
(4) encourage education and public understanding of the
facts of the Nakba, including the United States role in the
humanitarian relief effort, and the relevance of the Nakba to
modern-day refugee crises;
(5) support the resumed provision of social services to
Palestinian refugees through the United Nations Relief and
Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East;
(6) support the implementation of Palestinian refugees'
rights as enshrined in United Nations General Assembly
Resolution 194 and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights;
(7) recognize that Palestinians are a unique people who are
every bit as human as everyone else;
(8) reject bigoted efforts to question, dismiss, or
otherwise deny the existence of Palestinians and their
humanity; and
(9) ensure the United States ends its complicity in
Israel's ongoing Nakba against the Palestinian people by--
(A) prohibiting United States weapons from being
used to destroy Palestinian homes and forcibly remove
Palestinians from their land; and
(B) ending United States diplomatic support for
such actions.
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