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Chilean authorities and Palestinian ambassador Mai Al-Kaila gathered in a suburb of Santiago for the welcoming ceremony of 37 Palestinian refugees who had been travelling for more than 40 hours from a makeshift refugee camp on the Iraqi-Syrian border. They were delayed by fog at Santiago airport, but when they finally arrived in Recoleta, a huge welcome banner hung across the street of Recoleta, a suburb to the north of the Chilean capital, that will become their new home. "We are here today because we want to welcome our Palestinian refugee brothers who have come from the Iraq border and we are welcoming them to our kind country, to our Palestinian town (Recoleta) which has welcomed Palestinians for 100 years," explained the Palestinian Ambassador in Chile Mai Al-Kaila. The refugees arrived in Chile just one day before Palestinians marked the 60th anniversary of what they call the "Nakba", or "catastrophe," when at least 700,000 Palestinians fled or were driven from their homes during the creation of Israel. The group said they are all part of families that fled during the "Nakba," and finally settled in the Iraqi capital Baghdad. Fleeing violence and death-threats in Baghdad following the U.S.-led invasion of Baghdad in 2003, many Palestinian refugees became displaced once again, settling in harsh makeshift camps in the desert on the Iraqi-Syrian borders. "We left Baghdad after we were threatened, and we went to the desert to protect our children from death," said ...