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An Israeli settlement in Silwan, September 2015. (Photo: silwanic.net)
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Eviction of Palestinian families for a new settlement in Silwan
This morning (Monday) a large body of Israeli police evicted a Palestinian family (Abu Nab) from their home in Silwan and handed the house over to settlers from the extreme right-wing movement “Ateret Cohanim”. Palestinian inhabitants of the neighbourhood were put under strict curfew, shut in their homes with no coming in or out under any circumstances.
Such a case of forceful displacement of a Palestinian family and handing over the home to Jewish settlers has not taken place in East Jerusalem since the last Evictions in Sheikh Jarrah in 2009.
There is no way to explain the decision by the Israeli government to evict the house now of all times, but a decision by Israeli government to escalate the situation in East Jerusalem. Netanyahu’s statements about preserving the Status-Quo and attempting to de-escalate the situation can not be reconciled with this act of aggression.
Abu Nab’s family has been fighting to stay in their home since 2002, when the settler organisation, Ateret Cohanim, filed a lawsuit alleging that the land where Abu Nab’s property sits had been registered as hekdesh, or Jewish religious property, since 1881. A 2015 ruling from Israel’s Supreme Court gave Abu Nab’s family – comprised of 16 people living in two separate homes – until August 11 2015 to leave, and this was followed by an eviction order according to which the eviction is now being carried out. According to settlement watchdog Peace Now, the case is part of a larger scheme by Jewish settlers to seize 5,200 square metres in the area of Silwan’s Batan al-Hawa neighbourhood, where an estimated 80 Palestinian families live in more than 30 buildings.
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