Perhaps They Should March

Jordan Times Editorial

In his Aug. 29 speech to the Palestinian Legislative Council, Arun Gandhi, grandson of Mahatma Gandhi, urged the members of the PLC to lead a mass march of Palestinian refugees from Jordan across the Jordan River to their homes.

"What would happen," he asked, "if 50,000 refugees marched peacefully across the Jordan?" He argued that while many might be killed by the Israeli army, the outrage would wake the world.

Perhaps. One wonders at the losses to the Kingdom in such a case. When the PLO was directing operations across the Jordan River or the Green Line in the 1960s, Israeli retaliation would often be directed at Jordanian targets. The same tactic was employed by Israel in Lebanon.

Nevertheless, it is an intriguing question and one that is bound to be worrisome to Israel. After all, what would Israel do if faced with 50,000 peaceful unarmed marchers? Bomb Amman? Even for Israel that would seem a tad extreme.

Gandhi is advocating the kind of tactic his grandfather deployed against the British in India, to such great success. In Palestine, though in a different form, the mass popular unarmed demonstrations of the first Intifada led then Israeli Defence Minister Yitzhak Rabin to realise that "you can't win a war against women and children."

The most potent weapon Palestinians can wield is, and always has been, the moral argument. That the dispossession of some 800,000 Palestinians of their land and property in 1948 was an enormous injustice that has yet to be redressed is beyond argument. That justice demands that it be redressed is unquestionable. That Israel, backed by the US, is doing its best to avoid redressing this injustice is equally unequivocal. So how to make it happen?

Gandhi argues that not any means is acceptable in trying to reach this aim. Indeed, for a people that needs to maintain the moral high ground, there is even more reason to utilise only means beyond reproach, even if this entails devastating losses. After all, the losses have already been devastating, and no amount of negotiation or armed resistance seems to have improved the situation. The refugees continue to languish, and not only has talk of refugee rights been brushed aside, the US has as good as decided on their behalf that any return to their places of origin will be impossible.

Perhaps it's time for the world to accept that the refugees need to have a say in their own fate. Perhaps it's time for them to make their voices heard. Perhaps they should march.

This editorial was published in the Tuesday, August 31, 2004 edition of the Jordan Times. It is used here with permission.