Refugees have a right to return to their homes or receive restitution.
All refugees (including internally displaced persons), not just Palestinian refugees, have that right. The right to return home isn't just refugees' right either. In general, "[e]veryone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country," as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights puts it. Otherwise, you can't risk traveling abroad for fear of being unable to come back home.
> Presumably the problem of Palestinian statelessness
> can be satisfied within the territories occupied in
> 1967 (leaving aside for the moment the problem of
> Israeli occupation, obstructionism,
> settlement-building, all of which we agree are bad
> things).
It is theoretically possible that all Palestinians want to resettle in Gaza or the West Bank as soon as "a Palestinian state" gets established there. But that is not likely: some want to go back to their home towns inside the Green Line; others want to go back to their home towns in the West Bank and Gaza; yet others want to become citizens of other states (such as Jordan and the United States, to take just two examples). Each refugee should be able to decide his or her own destiny as he or she pleases.
> Now, if one wants to make an argument that such a
> Palestinian state would not be viable, that's an
> argument deserving of consideration, but from my
> ultra-left perspective, that should call into question
> the very notion of statehood as a demand for a
> revolutionary movement.
>
> After all, the call for a Palestinian right of return
> to 1948 territories is just as unviable and
> unrealistic. There does not exist a majority in
> Israel to support such a demand.
If you want to call "the very notion of statehood" into question, why should you care if a majority in Israel support a demand of Palestinian refugees to resettle inside the Green Line?
Besides, your questioning of "the very notion of statehood" is just a matter of your whimsy. In reality, you are a citizen of a state (Germany?), which issues you a passport, guarantees your rights and privileges as a citizen, and defines your duties (such as the duty to pay taxes). You can't give them up even if you wanted to. That being the case, you have no business demanding that Palestinians give up what you haven't given up yourself.
> When CUPE calls for open Canadian borders and the
> dissolution of the Canadian state, I'll revise my
> opinion.
That's a category mistake. CUPE is not demanding that Israel open its borders to ALL comers, including those who are neither Jewish nor Palestinian. CUPE is merely demanding that Tel Aviv not prevent Palestinians from returning to their homes of origin. -- Yoshie <http://montages.blogspot.com/> <http://mrzine.org> <http://monthlyreview.org/>