Palestinian refugee camps were first established to accommodate Palestinians who were displaced by the 1948 Palestinian expulsion and flight during the 1948 Palestine war. Camps were established by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) in Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.

More than 912,879 registered refugees live in the West Bank, around a quarter of whom live in 19 refugee camps. Most of the others live in West Bank towns and villages. Some camps are located next to major towns and others are in rural areas.

Some camps are located next to major towns and others are in rural areas. While the West Bank has the largest number of recognized Palestine refugee camps in the five UNWRA fields, the largest of them, Balata, has a population similar to that of the smallest camp in Gaza .

Balata camp is located in Nablus, in the northern West Bank. Originally intended to serve approximately 5,000 Palestine refugees, it is today the most populous camp in the West Bank with a registered population of 33,078 people.

Jan 27, 2025 · Since the beginning of 2025, Israeli forces have killed 53 Palestinians, including eight children, in the West Bank. These include 30 Palestinians killed in Jenin governorate. Nearly all of Jenin refugee camp’s 20,000 residents have been displaced over the past two months and an estimated 150-180 homes have sustained severe damage.

Jun 28, 2023 · The West Bank has 19 recognized Palestine refugee camps — the highest of any region. However, these refugee camps tend to have smaller populations than other Palestinian camps located in Gaza, Lebanon and Jordan. Like refugee camps in other areas, West Bank camps face overcrowding and limited resources.

Aug 31, 2024 · The West Bank has some 871,000 registered refugees, a quarter of whom live in 19 refugee camps, descendants of the Palestinians ethnically cleansed from their homes and lands to make way...

18 hours ago · Escalating hostilities in the occupied West Bank are putting the fragile ceasefire in Gaza at risk, the UN agency that assists Palestine refugees, UNRWA, warned in a statement on Monday. It comes a day after Israeli Security Forces (ISF) carried out a series of controlled detonations at the Jenin refugee camp, located in the northern West Bank ...

On 11 November, the UN Human Rights Office condemned Israeli forces’ “mass arrests, ill-treatment, and gratuitous humiliation of Palestinians during raids in refugee camps and towns across the West Bank” over the past month. The office reports that “a pattern of unnecessary, disproportionate and otherwise unlawful force used ... despite ...

16 hours ago · A Palestinian child runs through Nur Shams refugee camp in Tulkarem, West Bank, ... Since the ceasefire in Gaza went into effect, violence has ramped up in the West Bank, resulting in casualties ...