Civil Education in Jordan

The day after our visits to the Refugee camp we returned to the University of Jordan for a lecture on Civil Education. Although this lecture was filled with information, it was mainly a heartfelt speech. We were told that Europe "cut off the arm and took out the heart" of the Arab world to pay for their mistake. He told us that the Jews only paid for 7% of the land defined by the 1948 boundaries and that the rest was stolen from the Arabs by the British to seal their pact with Austria to deport all the Jews from Europe. We we told that the US invaded Iraq because it wanted Israel to be the strongest country in the Middle East and that the only way to make things in the Middle East right was to allow all the Palestinians return to Palestine and then have a government run by the majority. "We have over bred them!" he bellowed, "If we all return, there will be more of us then them!"

I wanted to state that this is the exact reason that the Israelis do not adhere to UN resolution 242 which recognizes the Palestinians as refugees, demands a military withdrawal of the occupied territories, monetary compensation, and the "right of return" for all Palestinians who left Palestine from 1948 to present day.

But I, like everyone else, remained silent.