Amnesty urges Israel to uphold Palestinians’ right to return on Nakba Day

Marking the Palestinian Nakba Day, Amnesty International has said that mass forced displacement in Gaza highlights the urgent need for Israel to uphold Palestinians' right to return their homeland.

"Generations of Palestinians across the occupied territories are deeply scarred by the trauma of being uprooted and dispossessed multiple times and with no prospect of return to their homes," Erika Guevara Rosas, senior director for Research, Advocacy, Policy and Campaigns at Amnesty International, said in a statement on Wednesday.

The statement marks the 76th anniversary of Nakba, or Catastrophe, when tens of thousands of Palestinians were expelled from their homes and lands in 1948 to make way for the creation of Israel.

Touching on the current situation in Gaza where some 2 million Palestinians have been displaced, Rosas stated that it is "utterly harrowing" to see the scenes of the 1948 Nakba repeat themselves in the besieged Palestinian enclave.

This Nakba day the fate of Palestinians is more perilous than ever – dispossessed and subjected to systematic human rights violations under a brutal occupation – with those in Gaza also facing the imminent risk of genocide," she noted.

Israel's brutality in Gaza

Rosas added: "Israel’s decades-long denial of the Palestinians’ right to return is one of the root causes of the conflict, and the escalation in violence of the past seven months shows that it must no longer be overlooked."

Touching on pressures on pro-Palestine campaigns and demonstrations, the group said that the "instrumentalisation of anti-Semitism" to discredit protesters or criminalise criticism of Israel’s policies, and the conflation of anti-Semitism with criticism of Israel’s violations of international law are "particularly problematic."

Israel has waged a brutal offensive on Gaza after Hamas' October 7 blitz into Israeli settlements.

More than 35,100 Palestinians have since been killed in Gaza, mostly women and children, and over 79,000 others injured, according to Palestinian health authorities.

In the occupied West Bank, nearly 500 Palestinians have been killed and thousands injured since October 7, along with daily arrest campaigns by the Israeli army.

Israel is accused of “genocide” at the International Court of Justice, which has ordered Tel Aviv to ensure its forces do not commit acts of genocide and take measures to guarantee that humanitarian assistance is provided to civilians in Gaza.