BADIL:
Project
Title: Legal Project for the Protection of
Palestinian Refugee Rights
BADIL –
an independent Palestinian non-governmental organization – is dedicated to
promoting and defending Palestinians through such ideals as equality, social
and political justice, and human rights “as enshrined in international law and
UN resolutions.”
Thus,
BADIL plays an integral role in the fight against “military occupation, racism,
colonialism and Apartheid” and works for a “durable solution of the historic
conflict between the Palestinian-Arab people and
Based on
the foundation of the increasing success in lobbying for international legal
and human rights in international fora and the lack of such refugee rights
legal expertise in the
The Legal
Project seeks to “advance the role of international refugee law and protection
mechanism in the specific Palestinian context, and increase the efficiency of
BADIL’s advocacy efforts undertaken in the framework of previously existing
BADIL projects.”
Project
achievements in 2001 included a request to the UN Economic and Social Council
by the UN Committee for Social, Economic and Cultural Rights for “effective intervention
for the protection of Palestinian SEC [Social, Economic, and Cultural] rights
in the 1967 occupied territories.”
BADIL
launched “an informal, systematic process of consultation about more effective
refugee protection” with the relevant agencies such as UNRWA and UNHCR. Lastly, BADIL has produced a body of
substantive and legal analysis and recommendations in support of “Palestinian refugees’
right of return and property restitution.”
The
Jerusalem Fund granted BADIL an award to maintain and continue the Legal
Project through 2004.