Palestinian refugee numbers pass 6m, authorities say

A man walks past a graffiti mural depicting a Palestinian woman clad in a keffiyeh scarf next to a depiction of a key above the Dome of the Rock, in the Jenin camp for Palestinian refugees in the north of the occupied West Bank on September 10, 2020 [JAAFAR ASHTIYEH/AFP via Getty Images]

More than six million Palestinian refugees are registered with the UN refugee agency, UNRWA, according to Palestinian authorities on Thursday, Anadolu Agency reports.

In a statement marking World Refugee Day, the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics said 2.5 million refugees live in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, constituting 42 per cent of the registered Palestinian refugees.

The statement said that refugees comprise around 66 per cent and 26.3 per cent of the population of the Gaza Strip and the West Bank respectively.

According to the statement, around 40.2 Palestinian refugees in the Diaspora live in Jordan, 9.7 per cent live in Syria and 8.2 per cent in Lebanon.

“These estimates represent the minimum number of Palestinian refugees, taking into account that they are unregistered refugees, as this number does not include those Palestinians who were displaced after 1949 until the eve of the war of June 1967,” the statement said.

“It also does not include Palestinians who left or were deported in 1967 on the grounds of war and those who were not refugees in the first place.”

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