Israeli authorities demolished 20 single- and
multi-family homes in East Jerusalem overnight Monday, the most
extensive house-demolition in the Palestinian sector of the capital in
recent years.
Violent protests carried on through much of the night in the village
of Qalandiyah, where most of the demolitions took place. Border Police
fired sponge-tipped bullets, stun grenades and tear gas against some of
the rioters, but there were no known injuries. Early Tuesday morning the
troops accompanied Finance Ministry building inspectors to carry out
the remaining demolitions.
“I have been in this business 20 years, and there was never such a
widespread operation,” said Ahmad Subalaban, an area coordinator for the
NGO Ir Amim, which promotes Jewish-Arab equality in Jerusalem. He added
that in the past, “at most they would demolish four or five
structures.”
Hassan Salameh, who owns a two-story building in Qalandiyah that was
demolished, told Haaretz the demolition order was received only on
Monday morning, and that it had been stuck onto the door of the building
during the night. “All my brothers, seven families, lived in the
building. Not even 12 hours passed from the moment we saw the demolition
orders and the time the bulldozers arrived. They destroyed everything,
the furniture and everything that was inside. If they had given us
warning, we would have had a chance to speak to them, we would have
brought all the papers. ... They destroyed my life. What will we do?
I’ll stay with my children until we rent an apartment or I’ll put up a
tent. I’m in shock,” Salameh said.
A treasury official said authorities removed possessions from the
Salameh house. “I personally removed a refrigerator and shoes. We
insisted that they take out their clothes,” the official said.
According to Ir Amim, the number of house demolitions of Palestinians
has increased sharply. This year to date, 78 homes have been demolished
(not including homes of terrorists), as opposed to 74 in all of 2015.
In 2014, 52 homes were destroyed.
An enforcement official confirmed that house demolitions were on the
rise. “Enforcement against illegal housing starts was always high
preference for us,” the official said. “Lately there has been a wave of
illegal housings starts, for example in Qalandiyah and Walajeh, in south
Jerusalem. All the building that we demolished in Qalandiyah popped up
at once over the past month and a half. We don’t want to get to the
point of high-rise buildings, which ruins things for everyone, also in
terms of village planning. Second, there is indeed a decision to
increase enforcement.”
Salameh said people living in the area are residents of Jerusalem who
own apartments and land within Jerusalem’s municipal boundaries, but a
few years ago found themselves on the other side of the separation
barrier, cut off from the city. He said many residents thought they did
not need building permits to construct new homes in the area beyond the
barrier.
“After they built the fence people said, ‘Come on, let’s build.’ I
personally had a building permit that had expired, and my only fault was
that I didn’t renew it. But a lot of people thought this place belonged
to the West Bank, not the municipality [of Jerusalem]. Big villas were
destroyed here tonight. People spent all their money to live in these
houses,” Salameh added.
Ir Amim said the demolitions reflected the municipality’s “cruel
policy.” “From a survey of the planning situation we made, it emerges
that the Jerusalem municipality does not prepare detailed plans for the
Palestinian neighborhoods of the city and brings about the failure of
any plan the residents make on their own initiative,” said the NGO. But
Regavim, which fights against illegal structures built by Palestinians
and Israeli Arabs, welcomed the operation, saying, “The government of
Israel proved to itself tonight that the expression ‘rule of law’ is not
an empty cliché, and that it can restore sovereignty to every corner of
Israel.”
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