June 1957 Arab Refugees

Henry R. Labouisse, director of UNRWA, in an interview in The Middle East Forum, warned:

“It cannot be denied that the outside observer gains the impression that the Arab governments have no great desire to solve the refugee problem and thus terminate the flow of international subsidy brought into the area by UNRWA and other related international and governmental agencies.

“… The refugees have not been wanted in the countries into which they have fled. Egypt evacuated the few thousand refugees who fled there, turning them back into the tiny Gaza Strip and maintaining close guard lest any of the 20,000 there slip back. Lebanon places severe restrictions on the refugees who have fled into her territories. Syria, with the largest usable area of arable land upon which hundreds of thousands could begin life anew, will accept no more.

Source: Regional Development for Regional Peace: A New Policy and Program to Counter the Soviet Menace in the Middle East, Washington, DC: Public Affairs Institute, 1957