- 24 mrt 2012
IOA serves demolition notice to Palestinian family in Bethlehem
BETHLEHEM, (PIC)-- The Israeli occupation authority (IOA) served demolition notice to a Palestinian family in Nahalin village to the west of Bethlehem on Friday.
Osama Shakarne, the head of the Nahalin municipality, said that the IOA civil administration handed the notice to Husam Shakarne, the owner of the house, claiming that it was built without permit.
He added that the two-story 120 square meters house provides shelter for a family of seven members.
http://fwd4.me/0x5D 26 mar 2012, 11:04 , Respect -
Maria 25 mrt 2012
AFEH warns of turning Islamic cemetery into Talmudic park
OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, (PIC)-- The Aqsa foundation for endowment and heritage (AFEH) has condemned the Jewish settlers’ desecration of Bab El-Rahma cemetery in occupied Jerusalem on Saturday and plans to turn part of it into Talmuic park.
It said in a statement on Sunday that Zionist fanatic groups in cooperation with the Israeli “higher court of justice” were launching steps on the ground toward that end.
AFEH also said that a group of 20 Jewish settlers offered Talmudic rituals inside the graveyard, which is adjacent to the Aqsa mosque, and danced over the graves leading to the destruction of two headstones.
AFEH quoted one of the guards of the cemetery as saying that he shouted at the settlers, telling them they should leave the cemetery but they refused and insulted him. They continued in their dancing that destroyed the headstones, he said.
The guard said that he summoned the police, adding that two border policemen and a female conscript came to the scene and were content with watching the settlers and did not even bother to talk to them.
Bab El-Rahma is a 1400-year-old cemetery and is near to Bab El-Rahma gate of the Aqsa mosque. AFEH said that any attack on the graveyard is an attack on the holy Aqsa mosque.
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OCHA: IOA demolished 20 Palestinian homes in West Bank last week
RAMALLAH, (PIC)-- The Israeli occupation authority (IOA) has demolished 20 Palestinian homes in the West Bank over the past week, a report by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in the occupied Palestinian land said on Sunday.
It said that the demolition streak took place in the Jordan Valley and displaced 60 people including 26 children.
It said that IOA bulldozers damaged 100 dunums in Salfit’s Kufr Al-Deek village and uprooted 100 olive saplings in Beit Dajan village in Nablus at the pretext they were planted in a military area.
OCHA pointed out that 29 Palestinians were wounded in Israeli occupation forces’ crackdown on a peaceful demonstration in Kufr Qadum to the north of Qalqilia last week.
The report said that a 14-year-old boy was badly injured when Israeli army ordnance exploded near him in the Jordan Valley.
http://fwd4.me/0xAA 26 mar 2012, 12:54 , Respect -
Maria 26 mrt 2012
IOF soldiers launch demolition campaign in Jordan Valley
JORDAN VALLEY, (PIC)-- Israeli occupation forces (IOF) launched a large-scale demolition campaign of buildings and installations in the northern Jordan Valley areas on Monday.
Local sources said that IOF soldiers stormed the Farisiya and Hima areas and unleashed their huge bulldozers against buildings, installations, and animal pens for the Bedouin inhabitants of the two areas.
They said that the soldiers closed off both areas and started razing buildings and tents claiming that they were built in military zones.
Ahmed Daraghme, an inhabitant in Wadi Maleh in Farisiya area, told the PIC reporter that 13 Jewish settlements in the northern and central Jordan Valley inhabited by 10000 settlers control most of the 1300 square kilometers area.
He added that the Bedouins are systematically evicted to nearby towns such as Tobas and Tamun.
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Israelis Demolish Shacks in Jordan Valley
TOUBAS, (WAFA) – Israeli authorities Monday demolished a number of Palestinian shacks in al-Himma area in the southern parts of the occupied Jordan Valley, according to a local official.
Aref Daraghmeh, head of Wadi al-Maleh village council, said Israeli forces stormed al-Himma area and demolished shacks used as dwellings by local farmers and shepherds.
He added that the Israeli authorities had notified the residents of its decision to demolish the shacks, but the farmers never appealed the decision to court.
He said this was not the first time the Israeli authorities demolish dwellings in the Jordan Valley area, which is part of a policy to vacate the scarcely populated valley of its local residents for the benefit of internationally considered illegal Jewish settlements that are mushrooming in that region.
http://english.wafa.ps/index.php?action=detail&id=19377
Israeli plan to expel all Palestinian Bedouins from Area C
NAZARETH, (PIC)-- B'Tselem center for human rights revealed an Israeli plan to expel the Palestinian Bedouin communities from Area C of the West Bank, which is under Israel's control, to other areas.
These Bedouin communities are composed of 27, 000 people and the Israeli occupation authority (IOA) will start to remove them from their homes during the current year, according to the center.
It added that the civil administration of the Israeli army intends in the first phase of this plan to force about 2, 300 Palestinian Bedouins to move from their homes near Ma'ale Adumim settlement to an empty area adjacent to Abu Dis village east of occupied Jerusalem.
The next phase is aimed to expel all Bedouin communities from the Jordan Valley within a period of three to six years, B'Tselem affirmed.
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Jerusalem Municipality Councilor denounces the policies and practices of the Occupation Municipality against Palestinians
By Eloïse Fonteyn for PNN
On 22 March 2012, the Palestinian Academic Society for the Study of International Affairs (PASSIA), an East Jerusalem-based think-tank co-founded and chaired by Dr. Mahdi Abdul Hadi, invited Dr. Meir Margalit, elected member of the Jerusalem Municipality for the Meretz Party, to give a presentation of the "Policies and Practices of the Israeli Jerusalem Municipality towards Palestinians."
During this presentation, Margalit described how the Occupation municipality systematically seeks to erase the Palestinian presence in Jerusalem by fear that current demographic trends challenge Jewish hegemony in the city.
Dr. Meir Margalit is one of the founders of the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions (ICAHD), a non-governmental organization established in 1997 to resist the Israeli demolition of Palestinian homes in the Occupied Territories.
Progressively, as it gained knowledge of the brutalities of the Occupation, ICAHD expanded its resistance activities to other areas – land expropriation, settlement expansion, by-pass road construction, policies of "closure" and "separation," the wholesale uprooting of fruit and olive trees, the Separation Barrier/Wall, the siege of Gaza and more.
Despite his active opposition to the Occupation Municipality's policies towards Palestinians, Dr. Margalit's partaking in the Occupation Municipality coalition has been criticized by activists and political leaders who consider any participation in Jerusalem municipal elections as a way to legitimize the Israeli occupation of the eastern part of the city.
For Dr. Meir Margalit, being inside the system is, on the contrary, an efficient way to advance the Palestinian cause, raise the awareness of the other elected members on the gravity of the Apartheid situation and transmit exclusive information on the Occupation Municipality to the international community and Palestinian activists and scholars. As he says as an introduction, "I am in the movement to fight the system from within. The struggle must happen both from without and from within".
From within, Dr. Meir Margalit has indeed a rare insight on the Israeli's management and control of Jerusalem. And as he explains, the main driving force behind the current Occupation Municipality's strategy is the fact that Palestinians represent a fundamental demographic challenge to Jewish hegemony in Jerusalem.
The latest official statistics, published on 31 December 2011, show that out of 933,133 inhabitants in Jerusalem, east and west, the Palestinians number 360,882 people, which is 37.7% of the total. But this reality is more likely to change in the future because Palestinian children represent 45.6% of 8 years old, 44.9% of 13 years old, and 44.9% of 17 years old.
Although these statistics are sometimes disputed, since they include for instance Palestinians having Israeli IDs but residing abroad, Dr. Meir Margalit believes that according to the current demographic trend, Palestinians could take over the Occupation municipality by 2020 if they decide to stop boycotting the elections.
It is precisely to prevent this to happen that the Occupation Municipality –which in Margalit's opinion takes probably its orders from the Prime Minister Office – has adopted a strategy aiming at both ignoring and controlling the Palestinian population of the city.
On the one hand, the occupation Municipality tries to ignore the Palestinian presence in Jerusalem by systematically over-shadowing elements of Palestinian identity, culture and geography.
Road signs, street names and touristic brochures are eloquent illustrations of this policy.
Although acts of vandalism such as spraying black paint on the Arabic translations of places names can be regarded as expressions of individual forms of delinquency, official municipal manipulation takes place when road signs that points at Jewish and Palestinian areas only mention Jewish monuments, neighborhoods or residential areas and fail to indicate directions to Arab neighborhoods or monuments.
The provocation goes as far as naming sensitive streets linking the eastern and western parts of the city with martial names such as "Jerusalem Brigade Street" or "Paratrooper Street", to unambiguously remind the Palestinian residents that the Israelis are the ones who detain the power.
Brochures used for the promotion of tourism serve the same purpose when they simply ignore important Palestinian areas or Islamic landmarks from their presentation of the city.
The Occupation Municipality's control over Jerusalem is also guaranteed by a series of practices and policies aiming at emptying the city of Palestinian residents.
First, the Occupation Municipality strictly controls the budget allocation for the provision of municipal services in East Jerusalem. Although Palestinian residents constitute 37.7% of the population, the Occupation Municipality dedicates only 8.79% of its budget to East Jerusalem, that is to say 417,767,470 NIS out of a total of 4,751,000,000 NIS.
And while 77% of East Jerusalem residents live below the poverty line and 62 % of the city's poor are Palestinians, they only receive 34% of the welfare budget.
As Dr. Meir Margalit puts it, "poverty is a tool of control. It is easier to control people who have to struggle for their daily survival. The Occupation Municipality's clear goal is to keep Palestinians in a state of poverty."
Indeed, the Occupation Municipality has visibly no intention to improve the situation. A recent research reveals that in order to bring East Jerusalem to the level of infrastructure enjoyed by the western part of the city, it should disburse around 550 million dollars. As Dr. Meir Margalit clearly points out, "this money will never be allocated, not only by lack of motivation but also because it is the best way to prevent Palestinians from building houses.
Indeed, according to the Israeli law, no building permit can be granted in an area where the level of infrastructure is not satisfactory".
The mechanisms of zoning, planning and awarding building permits are in fact another tool used by the Israelis to assert their control over Jerusalem. The Occupation Municipality places many obstacles to prevent the building of houses by Palestinians, such as the obligation to prove land ownership according to the Israeli system instead of Palestinian traditional customs, or the protection of specific areas such as the so-called Holy Basin district or the zones surrounding the Separation wall.
A major obstacle is represented by the deliberate belated approval of zoning plans on which the delivery of building permits is based. Thus the new Master Plan, which has been ready since 2010, has still not been approved due to the opposition of the Israeli Interior Ministry which thinks that the 4,000 additional residential dunams allocated to the Palestinians are too much.
Another form of manipulation concerns the categorization of land: the use of vague and abstract terminology such as "Not owned by the Israeli Land Administration", "Unknown", or "Not registered by the Israeli Land Administration", is an additional trick to take more land away from the Palestinians.
An additional way to deny Palestinian land ownership is the cost of building permits which can amount to 109,492 NIS for a 200 square meters house on a half dunam lot (including fees related to road development, sewage, water connection, Betterment Levy tax, etc.), a price that most Palestinian households cannot afford. This is part of the "economic weapon" used by the Occupation Municipality against its Palestinian residents, together with the systems of taxation or fines for illegal building.
In the past ten years, the latter totaled 221,994,201 NIS, a sum that in addition to weighing dramatically on the incomes of Palestinian families, constitute a "business", a financial boon, that no one in the Occupation Municipality is intended to cut.
By preventing Palestinians' access to property and demolishing their houses, the Occupation Municipality is attempting to physically expel the Palestinians, as further illustrated by the invention of the concept of "center of life" according to which Palestinians spending time in the Occupied Territories either for professional, educational or health reasons are threatened of losing their Jerusalem IDs.
However, as more and more Palestinians try to go and live on the "Israeli" side of the Wall, the effects of the "center of life" policy tend to be nullified. Jerusalem mayor, Nir Barkat, recently announced that the Occupation Municipality was willing to give back to the Palestinian Authority (PA) all the Palestinian neighborhoods located behind the Wall so as to stop having to provide them with services and infrastructures.
Similarly, according to Dr. Margalit, the prospect of the current Israeli majority losing future municipal elections could prompt Tel Aviv to get rid of the Palestinian areas of the city to the PA in order to decrease the number of Palestinian voters.
For the Meretz municipal Councilor, progress can be achieved by engaging a pragmatic rather than ideological dialogue with the Occupation Municipality. "The Israelis are more and more aware of the demographic force that the Palestinians represent in the city. If they think that they will lose the elections, they will be ready to share Jerusalem. Not for humanist reasons, not to condemn the Apartheid, but to ensure their own well-being.
Right-wing elected members of the Occupation Municipality don't understand the language of human rights or international law, the only argument likely to convince them is how much keeping East Jerusalem cost them, and what they could do instead with this money for the benefit of the Jewish people.
We have to speak their language to advance our cause." All the more that for the next municipal elections supposed to take place at the end of 2013, the incumbent will seek more votes from the ultra-conservative parties, which can result in a hardening of the discrimination against Palestinians, but also from Arab voters, who have therefore a tool to advocate for their rights.
Despite the numerous voices opposing his participation in the Occupation municipal coalition and the considerable pressure he is under from both sides, Dr. Margalit keeps on believing that "much work can be done from within without legitimizing the status quo".
As observed by one of the participants, notwithstanding the failure of diplomatic efforts, the time has come indeed to resume the dialogue with the Israelis on the issue of Jerusalem, to share practical ideas, including the possibility of creating a "shadow municipality" run by the Palestinians. A "strong political will on behalf of the Palestinians is needed to get out of the impasse."
When he is reminded that, according to many experts, the Palestinians could only obtain a maximum of 9 seats out of 31 if they indeed decided to run for the next elections, Dr. Margalit replies that if added to the 3 current Meretz seats, this would make a total of 11 mandates, which is exactly what the ultra-orthodox have at the moment –the best example of the kind of power a political group can get with 11 seats in the Jerusalem Municipality.
For him, ending the boycott is the only solution to preventing the Palestinians from losing Jerusalem. "I implore you to participate in the elections. You have the chance to change history; it is up to you to seize it."
The author can be contacted at: [email protected]
http://fwd4.me/0xEn 28 mar 2012, 13:21 , Respect -
Maria 27 mrt 2012
Demolition Orders Issued for Silwan Residents
The West Jerusalem Israeli municipality handed six Palestinian families living in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Silwan home demolition notices under the pretext of building without a permit, the Wadi Hilweh Information Center said Tuesday in a statement.
It said municipality staff accompanied by a large police force handed the notices to the residents.
One of the homes that received a demolition order was demolished seven years ago. It was later rebuilt. The owner has already received three demolition orders over the last five months.
http://english.wafa.ps/index.php?action=detail&id=19392
Migron’s Palestinian neighbors waiting to see if they get land back
Migron’s Palestinian neighbors waiting to see if they get land back.
High Court rejects compromise between government and settlers - evacuation set for August 1.
Residents of the West Bank village of Burqa are waiting for "real results" before celebrating this week's High Court of Justice ruling ordering the demolition of the Migron outpost, which Burqa residents say was built on land owned by Palestinians in their village.
In its ruling, the High Court rejected a compromise between the government and the settlers that would have delayed the evacuation of Migron, which the court had previously said must take place by the end of this month. The evacuation is now set for August 1.
"It's not the first time the High Court of Justice has ordered the eviction of settlers from our land," said Abdel Mun'im Ma'atan, who was one of the petitioners in the court case. "For the time being, everything is on paper, but we want to see real results, on the ground."
Ma'atan said he hoped the coming months would be calm but that it was too early to make plans for the land on which Migron has been located for more than a decade.
Abdel Kader Sumarin, who heads the Burqa village council, was cautiously optimistic.
"We hope this time the state enforces [the ruling] and that our children will be able to enjoy the use of the land," he said. "But based on past experience, it's understandable that people are skeptical and wary."
Sumarin and Ma'atan got angry when confronted with the settlers' contention that the villagers have not proven their ownership of the land on which Migron was built.
The ownership of the land was recorded in the land registry by Jordanian authorities before the Six-Day War, Sumarin said.
"We proved in court that no one sold their plot," he said, adding that the settlers' claim that the land was purchased by Israelis was based on forged documents.
Shlomo Zecharia, one of the lawyers who represented Peace Now and the Burqa villagers before the High Court, said there was no factual or legal basis to the contention that Palestinians had abandoned the land on which Migron was built. Settlers have argued both that they purchased the land and that it was abandoned.
Burqa residents said any joy they might have felt over the ruling was dampened by an attack on Saturday, in which they say Israeli Jews threw stones at three village residents who were tending livestock at the time.
One Burqa resident, a relative of Ma'atan, was injured by shrapnel during clashes with the Israelis, eyewitnesses told an investigator for B'Tselem, which investigates human rights violations in the West Bank.
Burqa residents said the stone throwing began about 9:30 A.M. on Saturday and that the shooting took place after several young village residents threw stones back at the Israelis.
Witnesses said at least one of the Israelis was armed.
Israel Defense Forces troops arrived on the scene about an hour after the clashes began and separated the two sides, witnesses said.
The IDF said it was investigating a report that a Palestinian was injured in a clash with settlers.
Several months ago, a mosque was set alight in Burqa. No suspects have been arrested.
http://fwd4.me/0xhi 29 mar 2012, 12:19 , Respect -
Maria 29 mrt 2012
Israel Seizes Thousands of dunums of land, Uproots Thousands of Trees, says Report
Marking the 26th anniversary for Land Day, the PLO said on Tuesday that Israel has so far this year seized 3626 dunums of land, uprooted 2418 trees and is planning to build 1805 housing units in West Bank settlements.
The PLO’s international relations department said in the report that Israel seized 3626 dunums in order to build the apartheid wall and to expand settlements.
It said 1235 dunums were seized around Jerusalem to build national gardens and 1639 were confiscated in Jerusalem and other villages.
The report also said that Israel is planning to build 1805 new housing units in settlements, 995 of which are going to be built in Jerusalem and 810 in the West Bank.
The report also stated that Israeli forces and settlers uprooted and destroyed during the last three months 2418 tree in the West Bank, most of the were olive trees. A large number of trees were transferred to the settlements.
http://english.wafa.ps/index.php?action=detail&id=19411
Israeli occupation to raze water wells in Al-Khalil villages
AL-KHALIL, (PIC)-- Israeli occupation forces (IOF) served water wells demolition notices to a number of Palestinians in villages near Al-Khalil on Thursday, local sources said.
Ibrahim Makhamre said that IOF troops handed him the demolition notice of his only water well south of Yatta town in Al-Khalil province.
Hussein Ghnumait said that he received demolition notifications of his water wells in Khirbat Abu Mousa to the west of Sourif town also in Al-Khalil province.
Meanwhile, Jewish settlers uprooted a number of olive saplings near Beit Hagai settlement, south of Al-Khalil, on Wednesday night.
Local sources said that the saplings are owned by Tobasi family in Rehiya village.
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Settlers Seize House Near Ibrahim Mosque in Hebron
On Thursday, March 29, Yediot Ahranot Israeli newspaper published on its website that settlers seized one of the Palestinian houses in Hebron City near Ibrahim Mosque (Mosque of Abraham), under the pretext that they have bought it from its Palestinian owners.
The Director General of Hebron Rehabilitation Committee Mr. Imad Hamdan told PNN "Settlers always claim that they are the owners of the houses they seize, but have they got any papers that prove it?"
"About 20 Settlers broke into the house at dawn. Yet, their claims are invalid and the Palestinian owners complained to the legal unit in Hebron Rehabilitation Committee," said Hamdan, "we are working on this issue until settlers get out of the house."
Hebron's police chief, Ramadan Awad, said that settlers showed illegal and fake documents and the Palestinian police had interrogated the Palestinian owners to make sure settlers won't sell the house.
According to the newspaper, senior officials from the Israeli army reached the area and started an investigation about this issue and interrogated the settlers and the Palestinian owner to determine the house's ownership.
Sources from Yediot Ahranot newspaper also assured that settlers will stay in the house as long as the investigation continues.
Settlers expressed their happiness for seizing the house that is few meters away from the Ibrahim mosque, noting that they are so proud and confirms the Jews right to live in Hebron, as its original citizens since 4000 years, as Shlomo Levinger one of the extremist settlers leaders claimed.
Knesset members expressed their happiness that settlers broke into the house; the member of the Knesset Michael Ben-Ari said that the Jews have the right to return to their original houses in Hebron, because those are the houses of their ancestors as he described in his racist statements.
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