Palestinian youth in Shatila camp launch #Action4Return week at Sabra and Shatila memorial

Read this report in Arabic.

The Palestinian Chess Forum in Shatila refugee camp in Beirut, Lebanon, launched the #Action4Return days of action for Palestinian return and confronting normalization with a symbolic memorial event for the Sabra and Shatila massacres on 17 September 2020.

Children and youth in the camp, and members of the Chess Forum, gathered in front of the monument of the martyrs of Sabra and Shatila camp, carrying banners, “We will not forget and we will not forgive – we are steadfast and we will return,” and “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.” They laid floral wreaths in the martyrs’ cemetery, affirming their determination as Palestinian refugees to both honor the martyrs and uphold their right to return to Palestine.

Between 16 and 18 September 1982, thousands of Palestinian refugees in Sabra and Shatila camp were massacred by far-right Phalangist militias, allowed into the camp and overseen by the invading Israeli army, then occupying Beirut.

The #Action4Return days, between 18 and 26 September, marks the commemoration of the Sabra and Shatila massacres, the September 1970 massacres in Jordan and the signing of the Oslo agreements, all attacks on the rights and struggle of Palestinian refugees for return and liberation. They are days of Palestinian, Arab and international action to affirm the adherence of the Palestinian people to their national, human, political, economic and cultural rights – the right to return home, reclaim stolen land and property and complete the comprehensive liberation of Palestine.