PALESTINIAN ASSEMBLY FOR LIBERATION

PALESTINIAN ASSEMBLY FOR LIBERATION DECLARATION OF FOUNDING PRINCIPLES

The Palestinian Assembly for Liberation Declares That:
The reunification of the Palestinian National Body1 is a pre-requisite to our peoples’ ability to mass organize and develop escalated, local and global, interventions to survive and defeat Zionist and Israeli colonization and subjugation of our land and people. Mass organization and practiced unity have marked every moment of strength in our struggle for liberation;
The Oslo Accords have played a significant role in fomenting division between and within the Palestinian National Body, thereby weakening the Palestinian capacity to mass organize, weakening the Palestinian national struggle for liberation and return, and weakening our cause internationally;
1 Defined as all Palestinians living abroad, and in the 1948 territories, in the West Bank, Gaza, and in the refugee camps.
Our liberation, and the reversal of the losses and damages suffered by our people and our movement, especially after Oslo, requires the simultaneous prioritization of both the Palestinian right to return and the reunification and reactivation of the Palestinian National Body, as accelerants of our struggle for the liberation of Palestine;
The reunification of Palestinian National Body requires that the re-activation and rebuilding of Palestinian political institutions occur on a popular and inclusive basis that re-prioritizes, above all else, the imperatives of return and liberation;
The Palestinian right to return is a collective, inalienable, and most basic human right without which self-determination of the Palestinian people is impossible. The delay of the implementation of the right to return is a grave breach of law, threatens the safety of millions of Palestinians, and threatens global peace;
Palestinians have a basic human right to refuse to comply with the dictates of a violent regime and have a fundamental right to protect themselves from Israeli violence and colonization.  The right of Palestinians to preempt, resist, and to protect themselves and to additionally be protected from war crimes, genocide, ethnic cleansing, and crimes against humanity is affirmed in UN GA Res 3246 (XXIX) of 19742, and cabined in UN GA resolution 60/1, which was endorsed by all UN member states in 2005;3 
It is incumbent for global peace, and for Palestinian survival and liberation, that there be no normalcy of political, diplomatic, cultural, or academic relations with institutions and organizations that serve, advance, and protect Zionist/Israeli supremacy, violence, colonization, dispossession, and subjugation of Palestinians;

The imposed dependency of our people, and their reliance, on conditional aid by hostile foreign powers and organizations for administration and sustenance, especially since Oslo, has also weakened and further divided our people- politically, culturally, and physically into micro-communities- and therefore weakened our global struggle for liberation and return;

There is an urgent need for our people inside Palestine to be supported in their struggle to remain on Palestinian land, and for our people in the refugee camps to survive and thrive until and after a return. Palestinians abroad must play an enhanced and active role as accelerants and resources of Palestinian sumoud, mass organizing, and meaningful reunification and must rise in more studied ways to meet the needs of our people, whose pressing immediate struggle is central to our collective struggle and aspirations;
2 UN GA RES 3246 (XXIX)
3 Paragraphs 138 and 139 of the 2005 World Summit Outcome Document (A/RES/60/1) state, “ 138 Each individual State has the responsibility to protect its populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity. This responsibility entails the prevention of such crimes, including their incitement, through appropriate and necessary means. We accept that responsibility and will act in accordance with it. The international community should, as appropriate, encourage and help States to exercise this responsibility and support the United Nations in establishing an early warning capability. 139. The international community, through the United Nations, also has the responsibility to use appropriate diplomatic, humanitarian and other peaceful
The drastically changed material, political, class and economic conditions especially since Oslo require a studied assessment of our conditions, successes, and our challenges so we may reunite around an enhanced value system that consciously guards against reproducing systems, strategies and dynamics of division, oppression, and defeat;

Mere agreements to work together and based solely on aspirations for liberation from our oppressors have not sufficed to deconstruct and dismantle that which has divided us; have not sufficed to create optimal conditions to sustainably coordinate our efforts, have not sufficed to build a vehicle for popular and inclusive Palestinian participation in political processes institutions and organizations that speak in our name and of our rights, have not best harnessed the power of our people; and have not sufficed to build a mechanism to sustain an enduring unity between our people;

ACCORDINGLY, THE PALESTINIAN ASSEMBLY FOR LIBERATION ENDEAVORS TO:

Practice a consciously guarded and renewed, maximal, national unity capable of sustaining coordinated and escalated mobilizations for Palestinian Return to and Liberation of Historic Palestine; 

Work to rebuild a functional, enduring and practiced unity between Palestinians abroad and those in the Refugee Camps, in the 1948 lands, in the West Bank, and in Gaza– as the basis for mass organizing for our return and liberation;
means, in accordance with Chapters VI and VIII of the Charter, to help protect populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity.”
Be honest and well calculated in our development of an enhanced political and social basis for Palestinian unity, reunification, and coordinated mobilization for return and liberation which shall take priority over all competing interests;

Develop strategic terms of engagement in all areas of organizing that advance our cause while consciously guarding against causing any harm, impingement upon, or negation of the Palestinian collective right to return, self-determination, self-defense, resistance, and liberation;

Prioritize the advancement and implementation of the collective right of Palestinians to safely and immediately return to their homes and lands in historic Palestine , as central to Palestinian liberation and self-determination;

Develop mechanisms to defend against the escalated international efforts to divest and erase Palestinian refugees and which seek to liquidate the right to return, and thereby the Palestinian people, physically, historically, culturally, and psychologically;

Work to develop dignified and creative mechanisms of self-reliance, sustenance, advancements in economy, agriculture and the sciences and mutual support to Palestinians inside Palestine and the refugee camps that decrease reliance on conflictual and hostile institutions, guided by the political basis outlined herein, so as to strengthen their capacity for sumoud, mass organizing, return and liberation;

Work to develop mechanisms of popular political participation by Palestinians in movements, organizations and decisions taken in our name, or as affect our rights as we also help re-establish meaningful, democratic, and representative institutions of Political organization(representation) of the Palestinian National Body .

WHEREFORE;

All working committees and projects of the Palestinian Assembly for Liberation shall  thoughtfully and strategically serve the principles and objectives articulated in this Founding Declaration.