Talking with Beirut's Middle-Class Palestinians

...Do you know that in some Gulf states Palestinians can't visit the oil installations/ Do you know that I, as a Palestinian, cannot go down to visit the refugee camps in South Lebanon...

...Middle-class Palestinians often express guilt pangs about the conditions of the refugees Yet few of them have ever visited even the six camps within a half-hour of downtown Beirut When I returned from trips to the camps I was eagerly questioned by Palestinian acquaintances about the refugees' opinions Some of the middle class would like to help but don't know how Jamil Hamdan, a tall, attractive engineering consultant with a PhD from the University of Illinois, was scarcely aware of his Palestinian background when he went to the U S for graduate study in the mid-1960s His mother had told her children little about Palestine after they fled Haifa in 1948 for Cairo and later Beirut, because she believed that they would have enough problems adjusting to a new environment and more strained economic circumstances Ironically, it was in America, he says, that "I saw how Arabs were treated and I became informed on the Palestinian question " Back in Beirut, and married to a lovely young Palestinian pediatrician, he feels powerless to affect his people's future When he and a group of engineers went into a refugee camp to set up a tutoring program, they were met with hostility and found it almost impossible to relate to the youths All except Jamil and one friend gave up immediately He now tutors two camp students privately in computer programming, but he remains disturbed about his inability to do more At dinner one night in a modestly well-off Palestinian home I asked my hosts whether they thought the Arab countries should do more for the refugees (Disavowing any responsibility for the problem, the Arab nations contributed only 2 5 per cent of the UN's budget for refugee support this year ) I was violently attacked by the family's two daughters-both graduates of American University in Beirut-who argued that economic aid might stop the refugees from becoming feda-yeen This outlook has been vehemently opposed by Dr Nabil Shaath, a leading Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) theoretician "We have shredded the theory that you shouldn't give Palestinians amenities in the camps, the feeling of political intellectuals that they can have amenities and keep their identity but that the refugees would lose it The regaining of self-confidence after the lesistance grew helped change this mentality You have to equip Palestinians to be first-class citizens when they go back " A Palestinian woman sociologist with whom I raised the issue responded more angrily "The middle class who take this approach need the camps to maintain their own sense of identity in the diaspora just as American Jews need Israel" With regard to the Jewish people, I found among most middle-class Palestinians a striking lack of personal hatred and what I believe is a genuine willingness to live in peace A majority of those I spoke with knew I was Jewish, and they took pains to distinguish between Jews and Zionists But they insisted they could five with Jews only on a basis of equality Dr Eugene Maklouf, a Beirut dentist who fled from Haifa and who actively seeks out anti-Zionist Jews on his trips outside Lebanon, said "I try to get my son not to see religion as a differentiating factor I teach him we are not fighting the Jews If a Jewish friend from abroad comes, I make a point of introducing him '' He admits he is not sure whether his son understands the distinction To be sure, such attitudes are not universal One wealthy housewife who proclaimed her bitterness about "having no homeland," told me "I hate the Jews I can't help it I think all Jews are Zionists Sometimes I feel it is wrong to teach my children these unhealthy things, but they have to know who took their country away from them " As for the creation of a Palestinian state, most of the people I talked to began by subscribing?with a notable lack of enthusiasm?to the official PLO goal of a democratic, secular nation encompassing all of Palestine Specifics were usually avoided, and the only example offered for bisectanan government was the uneasy relationship that exists between Christians and Moslems in Lebanon Once obeisance was paid to the ideal, the conversation usually turned to realities The pragmatists believe that, for better or worse, a state consisting of the West Bank and Gaza is the best the Palestinians can expect, the optimists hope that over time Israel might change from within and the two states could move closer together, and the pessimists are convinced that such a state would be a Bantustan oppressed by both Israel and Jordan The noted Palestinian intellectual Wahd Khahdia cool pragmatist, a member of one of Jerusalem's most distinguished families and a founder of American University's Institute of Palestine Studiesbecomes visibly impatient with questions about the economic or social viability of the proposed state In an impeccable Oxford accent, his slender fingers drumming on his large desk, he told me "The crux of the matter is whether or not you are willing to accept less than the whole of Palestine If so, then you try to make it as viable as possible This is the time when a whole convergence of elements, m the Arab states and even among the Israelis, seems to be focusing on a possible formula It would be extremely short-sighted of the Palestinians to let the situation go by default " Still, Dr Khahdi is not overly optimistic "Much will depend on how much the Israehs are willing to concede, what they offer The formula is the key The Israehs are missing an opportunity that won't occur again Why do they seize it on the Egyptian side and not on the Palestinian'' The political leadership, even within the PLO, has moved so quickly that maybe the Israelis are not aware " The optimists argue that peace and the emergence of a Palestinian entity on its borders would stimulate change inside Israel, making it more tolerant of ethnic minorities and less exclusively Jewish They appreciate the fact that many West Bankers are anxious to escape from occupation and willing to take the risk of a state Representative of this view is Gaby Habib, who directs the Near East Ecumenical Bureau, a church organization working to disseminate information on Palestine "At least if you get a kind of place called Palestine, it will be a seed for the future and delay the final liquidation of the Palestinian cause The state would be a philosophical challenge on Israel's borders, a stimulus of change from within Israel would be opened to integration The movement of history would be taking them toward a democratic secular state The Palestinians won't have an army but the cultural struggle will continue " The pessimists, on the other hand, contend that a West Bank state would be a political and economic puppet, existing on international charity, and at the military mercy of Israel, Jordan and the United States They believe, too, that it would be inadequate for the resettlement of all the refugees, especially those who lived originally within the pre-1967 borders of Israel And they doubt that it could make a dent on Israeli political opinion "The state plan," an angry young Palestinian lawyer told me, "means accepting territorial concessions and probably renders an end to the whole Palestinian question You can't come back later and ask for more With a settlement, every Arab regime that has signed the agreement will try to keep the borders quiet and disband armed Palestinian groups It would give the green light for the destruction of the resistance " The pessimists are further convinced that internal changes in Israel can only be achieved through military struggle "Look what happened after the Ramadan [October] War," a Left-wing Palestinian graduate student argued "The Israeli structure started cracking You need another war to get the people to realize that their system just won't work " Others, like Dr Maklouf, argue against a settlement for much different reasons "Peace will only come," the dentist explained, 'when the Jews are accepted simply as human beings and they accept others the same way A West Bank state would be the exact opposite, perpetuating separatism " Despite their many differences, however, nearly everybody I interviewed agreed that the West Bank should not go back to King Hussein, and that m the long run a West Bank entity would be transitory The October War has convinced the Palestinians that tune is on their side "One year ago," a young Palestinian housewife mused, "I couldn't have accepted a state Now we have recovered our pridenow it is possible But I don't think of this state as final...

...A SENSE OF NOT BELONGING' Talking with Beirut's Middle-Class Palestinians bytrudy rubin Beirut When you walk down this capital's chic Rue Hamra, past the sidewalk cafes and New-York priced dress shops, the superbly stocked bookstores and pmball parlors, you can see the mark made by the roughly 50,000 middle-class Palestinians who enjoy nonrefugee status in Lebanon Their names stand out on innumerable doctors' and dentists' shingles hanging from apartment balconies along the cross streets They are the proprietors of many of the smart clothing shops, work m the engineering consulting firms springing up here to service the Arab oil wealth, own construction companies, are active in banking, teach at Beirut's universities, and so forth At night you can find groups of smartly dressed Palestinians eating kebab and broiled chicken at the Horshoe Cafe on Hamra and likely as not discussing the possibility ot a Palestinian state Now that for the first time in a quarter-century this dream seems realizable, they are embroiled in an intense internal debate over what they wantand what they are willing to accept These are the people, or the children of those, who managed to leave Palestine in 1948 with some money or had relatives in Lebanon, enabling them to make a new start here Some, escaping with barely enough means to stay out of the refugee camps, worked their way to success in true Horatio Alger fashion Often this involved some family members spending lonely years on jobs m the Persian Gulf and sending money back to educate the others The acquisition of Lebanese passports has spelled the difference between being able to work without special permits and thus to live securely, and being stateless persons whose job prospects are constantly vulnerable to the whim of unsympathetic government officials In any future Palestinian state, these sophisticated, well-educated citizens (and their counterparts who have emigrated to other parts of the Arab world Europe and the Umted States) would be crucial to development-if they returned And their attitudes toward living with Jews provide some clues to the chances of peaceful coexistence I have spoken with doctors, dentists, architects, engineers, professors, merchants, accountants, secretaries, housewives, UN professionals, and teachers-both Moslems and Christians My sample is not scientific It comes mostly from the comfortable Ras Beirut area But it gives some idea of the mixed Trudy Rubin, an Alicia Patterson Foundation award winner, is on leave from the Christian Science Monitor emotions felt by Palestinians who have "made it" outside, yet are still drawn, in a variety of ways, to what they left behind Until 1967, most of them had settled into Lebanese life and, on the surface at least, were hardly distinguishable from the natives The Six Day War revived an awareness of their past, and since then they have been constantly reminded of it by the existence of the commando organizations A substantial number, though, would probably not go back A tourist agent told tne his business in Beirut was too good to give up An economist said his children had grown up here and would not want to leave their school and friends Others explained they were uncertain whether their professional skills would fit into a West Bank economy Repeatedly, however, the people I talked to emphasized that they should have the right to decide whether or not to stay in Lebanon "Until Palestinians can go to Haifa and then leave because they have chosen to leave, they will still be refugees," I was told by a doctor who admitted that he might not give up his well-established practice in Beirut to return to his childhood home Others were equally insistent about the right to visit or retire to their birthplaces Prosperous Palestinians often feel, too, that the Lebanese resent them for their financial success on the one hand and for the political agitation of the commandos on the other "The sense of not belonging is terrible," I was told by the wife of a wealthy merchant whose family originated in Jerusalem but fled in 1948 to Amman and then Kuwait ' We hold Kuwaiti citizenship," she went on, "and we live well in Beirut, but we don't belong anywhere I feel like someone m a camp " (Of course, the plight of those who hold only Palestinian identity cards and no passport is much worse ) This alienation is deeply resented I was sitting in the cafeteria of Beirut's American University hospital, chatting with six young Palestinian doctors whose families are scattered all over the Arab world Suddenly, a tall, dark, long-haired resident, a native of Ramallah on the West Bank who had been silent, started to shout "Do you know that Palestinians can't get jobs in most Arab countries...