Israel. Jordan. Lebanon. and Kuwait are four of the many host countries for the Palestine refugees. Refugee camps are provided for by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA). In 1969 UNRWAs meager resources made available only 10 cents per day per refugee: 5 cents for food. 4 cents for education and technical training. and 1 cent for medical care and sanitation. Palestinians are historically an agricultural people. Those few. approximately 30 percent of the total. who had technical skills when they were displaced in 1948 were easily absorbed into the surrounding countries at that time. Most of the displaced Palestiniansthere are approximately 2/2 million Palestinians in the world todayhowever. had no marketable skills and were consequently forced to stay in camps. Subsequently. during the past two decades. two generations of Palestinians have had little if any opportunity to learn the simple skills of their fathers and are now without any vocational abilities whatsoever. Only 2 percent of the refugees have been able to acquire marketable skills as a result of UNRWA projects. These conditions only intensify the radicalization that two decades of forced homelessness causes. and has formed the basis for the growth of the Palestinian refugees into a distinct political and military force in the Middle East. One aspect of this question emerged during a conversation with former Prime Minister Levi Eshkol during my visit to Israel in 1968. He told me that the Jews have been a minority wherever they have lived throughout history and that they will not be a minority again.
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Refugee refugee refugees