ABSTRACT
In today’s world of spiralling ethnic conflict, war, famine and poverty, refugees have become a familiar sight in news reports from across the globe. The UN agency tasked with addressing the safety and rights of refugees estimates that there are more than 25 million refugees from around the world. It is estimated that there are over 8 million Palestinian refugees making them the largest single group. These Palestinians lost their homes in 1948 and 1967 and they and their descendents have remained scattered across the world ever since. They form a Palestinian Diaspora – stateless and in exile from their homeland. The stories of these refugees are epitomized by symbols of belonging; they cling to the keys and property deeds of their lost homes. Their memories and the imagined sense of belonging of their descendents are as tenuous as the scent of orange blossom in the spring or the whisper of the wind through the branches of an olive tree. And yet such a sense of identity and belonging also sustains a national movement for self-determination and independence and calls for an end to Israel’s occupation of the Palestinian territories.
