Measures aim to annex settlements to city and turn Palestinian areas into a no man’s land, warn rights groups
By Jonathan Cook, MIDDLE EAST EYE, (WARNING. This site is anti-Israel)
January 1, 2018
The remains of a house after it was destroyed by Israeli troops in Beit Surik near Jerusalem, 15 November (AFP)
JERUSALEM – Israel is putting in place the final pieces of a Greater Jewish Jerusalem that will require “ethnically cleansing” tens of thousands of Palestinians from a city their families have lived and worked in for generations, human rights groups have warned.
The pace of physical and demographic changes in the city has accelerated dramatically since Israel began building a steel and concrete barrier through the city’s Palestinian neighbourhoods more than decade ago, according to the rights groups and Palestinian researchers.
Israel is preparing to cement these changes in law, they note. Two parliamentary bills with widespread backing among government ministers indicate the contours of Jerusalem’s future.
One bill intends to annex to Jerusalem some 150,000 Jews in illegal West Bank settlements surrounding the city. As well as bolstering the city’s Jewish population, the move will give these additional settlers a vote in Jerusalem’s municipal elections, pushing it politically even further to the right.
Construction work in Ramat Shlomo, a Jewish settlement in the eastern sector of Jerusalem (AFP)Another bill will deny more than 100,000 Palestinians on the “wrong” side of the barrier rights in the city. They will be assigned to a separate local council for Palestinians only, in what observers fear will be a prelude to stripping them of residency and barring them from Jerusalem.
Meanwhile, a web of harsh Israeli policies, including late-night arrests, land shortages, home demolitions and a denial of basic services, are intensifying the pressure on Palestinians inside the wall to move out.
These measures are designed to pre-empt any future peace efforts, and effectively nullify Palestinian ambitions for a state with East Jerusalem as its capital, said Aviv Tatarsky, a field researcher with Ir Amim, an Israeli group advocating fair treatment for Palestinians in Jerusalem.
“What is going on is ethnic cleansing, without guns,” Tatarsky told Middle East Eye. “Israel hopes to get rid of a third of Jerusalem’s Palestinian population through legislative moves alone.”
Demographic fears
Israel’s demographic concerns in Jerusalem date back to 1967, when it occupied and annexed East Jerusalem, combining the large Palestinian population there with West Jerusalem’s Jewish population. It also expanded the city’s municipal borders as a way to covertly annex West Bank land.
Israel initially set an upper limit of 30 percent Palestinians to 70 percent Jews in what it called its new “united, eternal capital”, but has been losing the battle to maintain that ratio ever since. Higher Palestinian birth rates mean that today there are more than 315,000 Palestinians in East Jerusalem, comprising nearly 40 percent of the city’s total population. Projections suggest Palestinians could be a majority within a decade.
Although few Palestinians in Jerusalem have taken or been allowed Israeli citizenship, and almost none vote in municipal elections, Israel fears their growing numerical weight will increasingly make its rule in the city untenable.
“What we have in Jerusalem is an apartheid system in the making,” Mahdi Abdul al-Hadi, a Palestinian academic in Jerusalem, told MEE.
“Israeli policies are dictated by demographic considerations and that has created a huge gulf between the two societies. Palestinians are being choked.”
‘Save Jewish Jerusalem’
Fear of the demographic loss of Jerusalem provoked the launch of a high-profile campaign by political and security leaders last year: “Save Jewish Jerusalem”. Fearful that Palestinians will soon be a majority and might start voting in municipal elections, the campaign warned Jewish residents they would “wake up to a Palestinian mayor in Jerusalem”.
Over the past year government ministers, including Education Minister Naftali Bennett, have aggressively pushed for the annexation of Maale Adumim, a large settlement outside Jerusalem, in the West Bank. Gradually, they appear to be winning the argument.
Late last month a ministerial committee was set to approve a Greater Jerusalem Bill, legislation intended to expand Jerusalem’s municipal borders to include Maale Adumim and several other large settlements in the West Bank. It won Netanyahu’s backing.
The settlements would be annexed in all but name, and their 150,000 residents would be eligible to vote in municipal elections.
De facto annexation
Yisrael Katz, the minister of transport and intelligence who helped introduce the bill, has said its purpose is to “safeguard a Jewish majority” in the city. A recent poll showed 58 percent of Israeli Jews support the plan.
Under pressure from the administration of US President Donald Trump, Netanyahu has temporarily put the bill on the back burner. Washington is reportedly worried that the legislation will stymie a peace initiative it is reportedly about to unveil.
The Israeli separation barrier separating the West Bank town of Bethlehem from Jerusalem (AFP)Ir Amim fears the legislation is likely to be revived when pressure dissipates. A position paper it published last week warned that the legislation was the “first practical move since the annexation of East Jerusalem in 1967 to implement the de facto annexation of areas in the West Bank to Israel”.
After decades of implanting Jewish settlers in the midst of Palestinian areas to prevent their development and growth, Israel is beginning the difficult process of disentangling the two populations, said Tatarsky.
Eviction notices
The effects are being felt keenly on the ground.
Last Friday, Israeli forces stormed the Bedouin village of Jabal al-Baba and issued “eviction” notices to its 300 residents. In August, the Israeli army demolished the village’s kindergarten school.
Jabal al-Baba stands between East Jerusalem and Maale Adumim.
“These Palestinian communities outside Jerusalem are like a bone in the throat for Israel,” said Tatarsky. “Israel is trying to make their life as hard as possible to force them to leave, and so create a territorial continuity between Jerusalem and the settlements.”
The latest raid on Jabal al-Baba came immediately after Israel notified the hundreds of residents of Walaja that a military checkpoint would be relocated close to the entrance to their village. That will cut them off from ancient agricultural terraces on Jerusalem’s uplands their families have farmed for generations.
Although many of Walaja’s residents have Jerusalem identity papers issued by Israel, the new move will effectively seal them off from the city, as well as their lands. The terraces and a nearby spring, where the villagers water livestock, will become “attractions” in an expanded Jerusalem metropolitan park.
Chokehold tightening
Meanwhile, Israel is tightening its chokehold on Palestinians in East Jerusalem’s built-up areas.
Those on the far side of the concrete wall have been effectively abandoned by the Jerusalem municipality, and are finding it ever harder to access the rest of the city, said Daoud Alg’ol, a Palestinian researcher on Jerusalem.
A bill by Zeev Elkin, the Jerusalem affairs minister, is designed to disconnect from the Jerusalem municipality Palestinian neighbourhoods such as Walaja, Kafr Aqab, Shuafat refugee camp and Anata, which lie beyond the separation wall.
They would be hived off into a separate local council for Palestinians, instantly reducing the city’s Palestinian population by a third.
“Once Palestinians are in a separate local council, Israel will say the centre of their life is no longer in Jerusalem and their Jerusalem residency papers will be revoked,” said Alg’ol. “This already happens, but now it will be on a much larger scale.”
Since 1967, Israel has revoked the residency permits of more than 14,000 Palestinians, forcing them to leave Jerusalem.
Twilight zones of neglect
Even though their residents pay taxes to the Jerusalem municipality, Palestinian areas outside the barrier are already “twilight zones” of neglect and lawlessness.
In Kafr Aqab, for example, which is sealed off from the rest of East Jerusalem behind the wall and a military checkpoint, residents receive few services. Israel, however, has also denied the Palestinian Authority access.
“They are living in a no-man’s land,” said Alg’ol.
A Jewish worshipper sleeps next to his weapon near the Western Wall in Jerusalem’s Old City (Reuters)These areas have become a destination both for criminals and for Palestinian families caught out by Israel’s intricate web of strict residency regulations. Palestinians in the West Bank are denied access inside Jerusalem’s wall, while Palestinians in Jerusalem risk being stripped of their residency papers if they move out of the city.
Couples who have married across that residency divide have found a refuge in Kafr Aqab as Israel slowly disconnects the neighbourhood from East Jerusalem. Residents say the population there has rocketed from a few thousand to tens of thousands in the past few years.
As a result, a building boom has taken place beyond the wall as Palestinians take advantage of Israel’s lack of enforcement of building regulations. That has offered demographic gains for Israel too, said Alg’ol.
Housing crisis
“Planning restrictions and land shortages inside the wall have created a housing crisis for Palestinians, making it too expensive for them to live there,” he said. “They have been forced to move to areas outside the wall to find more affordable housing. Economic pressure is creating a silent transfer.”
Palestinians in neighbourhoods inside the wall are being driven out in other ways, noted Tatarsky.
Traditionally, Israel has used a range of policies to strip Palestinians of land and prevent development in Jerusalem and justify house demolitions.
Those have included declaring Palestinian areas “national parks”, thereby criminalising the homes in them; confiscating the last green areas to build Jewish settlements; and allowing settlers to take over Palestinian properties in the Old City and surrounding neighbourhoods as Israel seeks to strengthen its hold over the city’s holy sites, especially al-Aqsa mosque.
There are now some 200,000 Jewish settlers living in East Jerusalem.
“Palestinians are never part of the planning in Jerusalem, and their interests are never taken into account – they are always an obstacle to be removed,” Alg’ol told MEE. “Israel wants the land but not the Palestinians on it.”
Late-night raids
Pressure has mounted on Palestinians in Jerusalem, noted Tatarsky, as their communities have been denied schools and basic municipal services. More than 80 percent of Palestinian children live below the poverty line.
The Jerusalem municipality and police have also begun stepping up “law enforcement” operations against Palestinians – or what residents term “collective punishment”. Under claims of “restoring order”, there has been a wave of recent late-night raids in areas like A-Tur and Issawiya. Large numbers of Palestinians have been arrested, demolition orders issued and businesses closed.
“Israel is using the same militarised methods as in the West Bank,” said Tatarsky. “The assumption is these pressures will encourage them [the Palestinians] to move to areas outside the barrier, where sooner or later they will lose their residency rights.
“Israel has realised that is an opportunity it can exploit.”
The office of Jerusalem’s mayor, Nir Barkat, issued a statement to MEE denying that the situation of Palestinians in East Jerusalem was deteriorating. It said that there had been dramatic improvements in Palestinian areas in the provision of schools, community centres, sports fields, new roads, postal services and welfare.
It added that Barkat had “developed a plan unprecedented in scope and budget allocation to reduce gaps in East Jerusalem in order to address the 50 years of neglect he inherited from his municipal predecessors and successive Israeli governments”.
Alg’ol said the municipal claims were a denial of reality. “Israel wants to create a make-believe city free of Palestinians,” he said. “Where it can, it is ethnically cleansing them from the city. And where it can’t, it simply hides them from view.”
@ Sebastien Zorn:
Yes, I’ve read a lot of Flint on Baen Free Library.
@Edgar G:
That’s major motion pictures. The earliest film going experience I recall was the the New York World’s Fair. I was 5 and my mother and 12 year old sister sneaked me into an experimental film — small children were not allowed, I sat on the folded seat to look taller — in which their were glowing buttons on the armrest of each seat.
It was something about a fire, and firemen and it had two endings (they did that a lot in the 30s for test audiences, and in at least one released film I later saw.) The audience got to vote for which ending they wanted by pushing the buttons on the seat and then saw the completed film, it was very short.
Here’s an idea: How about doing films about pivotal moments in Israeli history, including this one, with two endings, one hypothetical and one the way it happened. The Stephen Plaut Piece is an exaggerated example of that.
https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/91917/peace-last-palestine-2013-steven-plaut
I don’t know what their politics are, but the acknowledged masters of Alternate History are Harry Turtledove and Eric Flint
@Edgar G.
If I don’t do it this way, it may erase the first one. I was 8 and a half. I remember clambering over the seats — with people in them I suppose — in a frantic, terrified dash to escape the theatre when the police shot Artful Dodger as he was climbing a building and he fell, presumably to his death. I made it to the doors before the ushers stopped me. I had never seen violence before.
As for 2001. I empathized with the computer as it talked about its childhood and begged for its life while the astronaut shut off its brain, one node at a time. I didn’t understand anything else in the film. I was very sad afterwards, when we all went out to eat outside at Rockefeller plaza, and everybody else was so chirpy and cheerful.
It was the first talking picture. 1927. My parents turned three that year, albeit in different places, one in Hungary, and one in America. I should ask my mother if she remembers the first time she went to the movies.
My earliest memories of going to the movies are going to see Oliver and 2001. 1968
@ Sebastien Zorn:
Oh yes….Our Community was still talking about Al Jolson and the “Yiddishe picture” “The Jazz Singer” when I was a baby and long after. In those days Ireland was very backward when it came to movies and we saw them sometimes only years after they were released. A Farbrente Catholic country, ruled by the Church, they had a strict Censorship. They’d show a certificate before the picture, and at the bottom was always R. Ola a scrudu, (long accents over the capital “O”, the 1st ‘a’ and both “u”s.. the last word meaning “inspected or examined.”),,,…
My dear older sister who generally looked after me, brought me to see that picture in one of the older, cheaper cinemas.. I may have been about 3-4. I remember vividly that when he started to talk-or sing- I got such a fright that I went scuttling away from the screen under the seats, and they only grabbed me about 5-6 rows back…..
In fact I’m going to email my sister after this post to ask her if she remembers the incident. I only saw it again about 15-16 years ago passing a theatre and saw it advertised…
@ Edgar G.:
Did you know that Al Jolson was of LItvak descent?
@ Sebastien Zorn:
Well his eyes were a major reason for his great success, talented though he was also. I don’t know what to say about your eyes…. send them to me and I’ll have a look at them. Just the eyes, not the whole person.
By coincidence Marty Feldman, whom you’ve mentioned (I think) several times, also has a similar appearance, (or did you mention Gene Wilder) …I’m knowledgeable to an extent on the old films or actors, but know little or nothing about the later ones.
One thing I didn’t like about Eddie Cantor-apart from his “milky” sounding speaking voice- reminding me of El Brendel minus accent- was the way he danced-sort of- like a sailor’s hornpipe -sort of- whilst clapping his hands together like a trained seal. This seemed to put people into hysterics, which I could never understand, attributing it to a peculiarity of Americans. I far preferred Al Jolson..THERE was real live-wire talent.
Edgar G. Said:
such as myself, presumably. But not the Great Eddie Cantor.
@ Sebastien Zorn:
Yes I’ve seen it in books and occasionally on interviews, especially with pseudo comedians who roll their eyes at the same time.. I though of it, but couldn’t see to which post of mine it could apply, so decided to assume it was literal. It’s just not what first comes to mind. No matter.
@ david melech:
reminds me of this hilarious bit from “Canadian Bacon” (1995)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cC1f2e6Kk7c
also if you click on the @ name in red, it will jump to the comment being responded to.
tell me about it was a sympathetic response to googling Melechet and getting gibberish. It means, “I know what you mean, been there.”
@ Edgar G.:
It’s a colloquialism. I mistakenly assumed it was universal.
@ Edgar G.:
Everything that is federal must be bilingual. Including gov. Ministers + anyone on the fed gov payroll. Anything produced and sold within the same state, province and or territory can be single lingo. But WAIT for the biggy TRI lingo? A group of persons are after SIGN lingo to be added. What most don’t know in queen trudeaus country is that imperial measure is still legal.
@ Edgar G.:
I think some years ago French Immersion was changed from “all Schools” to some “designated” schools.
@ Sebastien Zorn:
In all Canadian schools ever since that swine Trudeau the elder, ordered that ALL Canadian products, imports etc had to be bi-lingually labelled. French and English… it’s been a problem here. Only in Quebec and a variety of small enclaves back East, do they speak French. The rest of the country hates it. Maybe in one of two of the small Atlantic provinces. I live in British Columbia, and as far as I know there is only one small enclave of French speakers where it’s their home language. In New Westminster, B.C. a suburb of maybe 1000 people called “Maillardville” That Bluegrass band of non readers I played with for a few years which we discussed here, all lived there.
Stores were instructed to place the French instructions side of the shelf item facing out, so as to be the first seen by the customer, and crap like that. My cousin Lennie Jackson, for many years chief super of the Grace D’Art chest Hospital in Montreal, and many of his Jewish colleagues were given an ultimatum to learn colloquial French within 2 years or lose their jobs. They all emigrated to Israel.I met Lennie when I brought my wife to The Laniado Hospital in Netanya (Belzer) for the birth of our first child. WAS I SURPRISED, because I’d seen him in his Montreal home only the year before, staying for a week, en route to a trip back to Ireland. His wife (later deceased) was Elie Weisel’s elder sister Beatrice (Batya)
Anyway, there is a school programme here called “French Immersion” where EVERYTHING is taught in colloquial French and no English spoken at all. It seems successful, but limited. Like the Israeli Ulpan, but more intense.
You csan learn some Yiddish, even Hebrew, from free internet courses I believe. Even as an intellectual exercise it has benefits.
@ Sebastien Zorn:
Sorry..?? Tell you abut what….? This is one problem, sometimes matching an answer to an earlier comment, especially during an ongoing discourse generating comments as they come to mind,and not in strict rotation, or order.
An extremely in depth and detailed article on the same subject of Jerusalem and the Arab neighborhoods plus what to do about it is found at
http://jcpa.org/a-jerusalem-solution-one-sovereignty-multiple-local-authorities-including-for-the-arab-neighborhoods/
A lot of Americans, such as myself and my late sister, have a real problem learning foreign languages other than English, for some reason, and not for want of trying. Maybe they start us too late in school. On top of that, many parents, such as mine, have thought at various points that bilingualism is unhealthy. I know my father did. And this, despite the fact that both of my parents, speak or spoke, several languages fluently, and except for the children, I grew up in a Hungarian speaking household until I was almost 10. My maternal grandparents were the same. My mother and uncle didn’t learn Yiddish or Hebrew, despite growing up in a Yiddish and Hebrew speaking household in Crown Heights, Brooklyn.
@ Edgar G.:
Apparently, it’s not uncommon. Just found this, as well. See introduction:
https://www.cjh.org/pdfs/Rabbis.pdf
@ Edgar G.:
Tell me about it.
@ Edgar G.:
No problem.
@ Sebastien Zorn:
Thayt;s odd..I just type in “Melekhet” and pages of comment about the Baraita of …etc.et.c come up.
@ Sebastien Zorn:
I apologise sincerely Sebastien, I was getting the idea that you might be kidding me along . I still find myself surprised to encounter what are to me, very Jewish Jews, like yourself I think a dedicated Jew if not religiously, who doesn’t understand any Hebrew at all.
I always thought, and I suppose it’s a fault difficult to permanently break, that all Jewish kids went to Hebrew classes after normal school, to learn about their heritage, and incidentally a bit of Hebrew, then barmitzvah, where Hebrew is a “must”; and after, a bit of study just so as to know something.
. I read about that Rabbi and the cloned pigs. I’m certain he is dead wrong, although I’m no Rabbi or even within a 100 miles of being such. I believe the Din says that not only must it be right, but also have the appearance of being right. And a pig, cloned to the gills and however kosher (which I certainly don’t believe) does not have the appearance of being anything but Chazer.
When the imitation milk powder came out, being parve and capable of use in tea after a fleishig meal, there were many…including myself who, although not really religious have always even under complicated circumstances, been strictly kosher…would never touch the stuff.. Anyway, that Rabbi, from his picture, looks as “mad as a hatter”…or a March Hare. (no pun intended but he has a very scraggly beard)
Just to clarify …all through my growing up, and we sometimes would have to travel down the countryside, we always brought apples, hard boiled eggs, cans of salmon (and an opener) along with loaves of cut and buttered bread, sometimes bottles of milk too. Often drank local welll water tastingof lime. The big racing event in Ireland is the Irish Grand National at Fairyhouse. It generally happens during the Pesach intermediate days (Chol Hamoed). We always went, and would be very noticeablebecause we brought matzoh, gefilte or fried fish, plates, knives, forks etc. The goyim would stare at us. I would often stare right back.
So again apologies. @ Sebastien Zorn:
@ Edgar G.:
@ Edgar G.:
The title is in Hebrew. It just comes up question marks when I try to copy it. The link is here.
correction: Melekhet from: https://www.worldcat.org/search?q=au%3AAbraham+Koplowitz&qt=notfound_page&search=Search
It was cited as a link in this article, “The Struggle for legitimacy: The Orthodox rabbinate in mid-nineteenth century America” It’s about Kashrut, I can tell you that much. I asked david Melech because the first word is Melechet.
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2FBF01848253
It’s a timely topic because of this sort of issue
https://www.jta.org/2018/03/22/news-opinion/rabbi-says-meat-genetically-cloned-pig-eaten-jews-including-milk
But, I am mostly curious because I don’t read Hebrew and the book is in Hebrew though published in New York in 1948 and the author
http://kevarim.com/rabbi-avraham-yaakov-koplowitz/
was my maternal great grandfather. And I have no one to ask. Though, I am aware it is a digression, chit chat is closed.
@ Bear Klein:
So from now on with G-D’s Help, any sparks that fly, will be from somewhere in Iran, with maybe a tryout first on that underground Syrian site. I wrote to government yesterday a suggestion that they might consider thinking abut a penetration bomb, with a small nuclear device attached, well protected against trauma, to explode underground, which should destroy every part of any installation there, with no residual fallout above ground.
Just hoping.
@ Sebastien Zorn:
I have no idea there is a book with that name. I gave you the meaning of the word you quoted. For instance if you type in “Melekhet” you’ll get a slew of entries discussing Baraita-De- Melekhet HaMishkan for instance. The Mishkan was the name for the Tent Tabernacle in the Wilderness. . A Baraita is a commentary by maybe one of the schools of Jewish discourse wich is not included in the Mishneh, which may not be as famous as the top Babylonian schools. And from there you can find that Melekhet has a variety of more subtle meanings, which I mentioned earlier..
Please remember and repeat after me….. “He is not a Rabbi…” (meaning me)..
I keep wondering if you have been kidding me about this.
@ Edgar G.:
So, what’s the title of the book, then, in English?
@ Edgar G.:
Good News Bolton IN!
McMaster OUT….Bolton .IN….!! National Security Adviser…..!!!
@ Sebastien Zorn:
It means the work connected with the Tent Tabernacle in the Wilderness, and became used for all work, not neccessary physical, but constructive thinking for instance.
Not usre I have it exactly right, and I’m sure there’s much more to it. If you key in the word, you’ll find it used in a variety of ways, attached to mishnaic commentary on Torah, Shabbat etc………I think….
correction: Melekhet from: https://www.worldcat.org/search?q=au%3AAbraham+Koplowitz&qt=notfound_page&search=Search
@ david melech:
So only humor at the expense of women and infidels was tolerated. And it’s all gallows humor. Literally.
Know this film? great film: Looking For Comedy in the Muslim World. Brooks. 2005
Trailer:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x5Jq1BxHkPs
Apropos of nothing, since chit-chat is closed, can you tell me what “Melekh ha-kodesh” means in English? Google translate comes up with gibberish.
@ Sebastien Zorn:
better still for a real party belly fool of laughter https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humour_in_Islam
Reminds me of the old joke:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_humour#About_Antisemitism
Actually i found the article reassuring! I hope israel is doing everything it accuses her of to ensure a jewish majority. The Arabs don’t care about fairness. They are upset that israel is once again preventing them from taking over with an Arab majority.
@ jjs110:
@ jjs110:
Disgusting that this good site is besmirched by such hog wash. Please keep the Jew haters off and let them preach to their followers on their yellow rags.
You should really not post articles by Jonathan Cook. He is an avowed pro-Palestinian shill and a supporter of Palestinians terrorism. Don’t publish him. He is even worse than Haaretz when it comes to distorting facts and misrepresenting the truth at every turn.