RAMALLAH, West Bank — Two Palestinians – Mohammad Abu Thaher and Nadim Nuwara – were shot dead by Israeli soldiers during “Nakba Day” commemorations near the Israeli military base of Ofer just outside Ramallah, according to Palestinian medical sources.

At noon on Thursday, May 15, an eerie silence fell on the West Bank City of Ramallah as sirens wailed for 66 seconds. Following a march from the late President Yasser Arafat’s Mausoleum, hundreds stood at the city center to commemorate what they refer to as the ‘Nakba’ or ‘catastrophe’ that befell Palestinians in the 1948 war.

Alongside a bagpipe-playing marching band and local scout groups, Palestinians, young and old, carried maps of historic Palestine and large metal keys – symbols of the homes lost decades ago and the right to return to them. Actors mounted atop a stationary truck re-enacting scenes depicting the Nakba.

Mohammad Eliyan, who heads the Committee to Commemorate the Nakba, said the Palestinian right of return to their ancestral homes was key to a just solution to the conflict. “This May 15, as we observe this sad occasion, we say that we are stronger and more determined to stand up to the Israeli government’s policies that continue to dispossess Palestinians,” he said.  

Similar marches took place in the West Bank cities of Bethlehem, Nablus, and Tubas to mark the day. At least five Palestinians, two of whom are declared dead now, were injured in clashes with Israeli soldiers in the environs of Ramallah and the southern city of Hebron, as protesters were met with live fire, teargas and rubber-coated steel bullets.

On Wednesday, the eve of the anniversary, Palestinians clad in black shirts carried 66 torches through the streets of Ramallah. In a statement broadcast on local television, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas accused the Israeli government of making the two-state solution more difficult to attain, leaving one of two possibilities: a bi-national state or a racist apartheid regime.

“After 66 years, we have proved that we will bring Palestine back on the map as an independent sovereign state with East Jerusalem as its capital,” Abbas said.

In 1948, more than 800,000 Palestinians fled or were expelled by force from their homes and prevented from returning.

Figures released by the Ramallah-based Central Bureau of Statistics this week put the number of registered Palestinian refugees at 5.3 million. Those refugees live in 58 United Nations-run camps in Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

Fatah leader Marwan Barghouti, imprisoned in Israel on murder charges, said in a written statement that any solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict that does not guarantee the right of return is unacceptable.

“The right of return for Palestine refugees to their homes from where they were forcibly transferred is a sacred right that can not be compromised, a right guaranteed by international law and enshrined in UN General Assembly resolution 194,” he said.

In Gaza, dozens of Palestinians demonstrated at the fence separating Palestinian lands and Israel in northern Gaza Strip, raising Palestinian flags and banners emphasizing their commitment to the land and the right of return.

In Beit Hanoun in northern Gaza, Palestinian factions marked the Nakba’s anniversary by delivering speeches stressing that the right of return doesn’t drop by time.

“The right of return will remain the subject of unanimous support by all the Palestinian people everywhere,” said Zakaria al-Agha, a member of the PLO’s executive committee.

He affirmed that the Palestinians reject any alternative solutions other than return, noting that the Israel’s demand to be recognized as a Jewish state is meant to deprive refugees from the right of return.                                            -Al Jazeera