Commenting at an appearance at the Foundation for the Defence of Democracies, Haley suggested on Tuesday that the Trump administration would consider an official rejection of the Palestinian demand that all refugees who were displaced as a result of the Nakba (Catastrophe) and their descendants, be allowed to return to their ancestral homeland following a peace deal with Israel.
Asked whether the issue should be “off the table,” Haley replied, “I do agree with that, and I think we have to look at this in terms of what’s happening (with refugees) in Syria, what’s happening in Venezuela.”
“So I absolutely think we have to look at the right of return,” she added.
The Palestinian right of return is a political position or principle based on which Palestinian refugees are entitled to go back to the territories now occupied by Zionists. They also have the right to the property they left behind or were forced to abandon when they were expelled from their homeland in the aftermath of the 1948 Arab-Israeli war.
The Palestinians have for years insisted on their right to return as part of any solution to their decades-long conflict with the Israeli regime.
Haley was in fact suggesting that the highly pro-Israel administration of President Donald Trump would consider an official rejection of that Palestinian demand as it prepares to unveil its so-called “deal of the century” on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Nikki Haley also referenced US aid cuts to Palestinian refugee agency UNRWA which estimates that there are at least five million Palestinian refugees alive today, a figure Haley disputed.
“We will be a donor if [UNRWA] reforms what it does … if they actually change the number of refugees to an accurate account, we will look back at partnering them,” she argued.
A report by Foreign Policy revealed Friday that the Trump administration has decided to “end funding altogether” to UNRWA, a move expected to worsen the agency’s financial crisis. The report follows revelations earlier this month that US President Donald Trump’s senior adviser and son-in-law, Jared Kushner has been pushing for the refugee status of thousands of Palestinians to be removed in an effort to halt the majority of UNRWA’s operations.