القدس: خمسة عقود من الإخضاع والتهميش
النص الكامل: 

Successive bloody incidents occurred in Jerusalem during the first half of 2014 that surprised and shocked observers on both sides of the “Green Line,” especially since the general conviction prevailing amongst them was that “the issue of Jerusalem is over”; that the occupation had succeeded in taking full control of the land and its people; and that the process of unification and annexation had been crowned with success, so that now many of Jerusalem’s youth now taste nothing other than Israeli products, spend all their time in West Jerusalem, and listen only to Hebrew songs; that thousands of them have obtained or desire to obtain Israeli citizenship; that the plan for the complete separation of Jerusalem and the West Bank has been realized through the rings of settlements, diversionary roads, and the so- called separation wall; that the Palestinian sector of Jerusalem’s economy has been completely destroyed and made totally subordinate to Israel’s as a marginal service economy; and, finally, that the Israeli occupation has dealt a deathblow to the institutional infrastructure and suppressed Jerusalem’s Palestinian political elite. It would please Israeli politicians to declare,

with pride and self-aggrandizement, that Jerusalem’s Palestinians desire to link their fate with that of Israel rather than with the Palestinian Authority. They are used to higher incomes compared with the incomes of their compatriots in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. They have grown accustomed to advanced health and social security services, since families with numerous children receive support from national insurance, while retirees and widowers receive financial aid. The citizens of Jerusalem will therefore never give up all these benefits in order to join the “failed” Palestinian Authority. For all these reasons, “United Jerusalem will remain the eternal capital of the state of Israel,” a matter on which the majority of Zionist political factions have reached consensus.

The truth of the matter is that, in the mind of the colonized, the colonists have failed, everywhere and at all times. Israeli Orientalism is no different than Western Orientalism in its inability to comprehend the behavior of peoples yearning for freedom and independence. France did not grasp this in Algeria, nor Britain in India, nor Israel in Lebanon. Israel failed to read the writing on the wall in 1987, when the first intifada broke out, nor did it anticipate, with all the tools at its disposal, the al-Aqsa intifada of 2000. Similarly, it was incapable of realizing the extent of Gaza’s ability to resist and hold out in 2014. It also failed to understand Jerusalem society, which it holds in its hands and over which it keeps constant watch.

Such lack of foresight and comprehension can be attributed to a number of factors, and looking into all of them is beyond the scope of this essay. Yet certainly one factor is that the colonizers were and will remain foolish, caught up in the tattered remains of power that obstruct their perception, and so they fail to recognize the true force driving the rebellion against them. They thus conjure up justifications and rationalizations with which to convince themselves, so that with the passage of time these turn into a part of their colonial ideology. In the Palestinian case, the Israelis have persuaded themselves to believe religious and historical pretexts that gradually became rationalizations for a racism that was inherent in them from the start. These were the embodiment of a national, cultural, and class superiority that the Israeli colonizers tirelessly transformed into legal formulations designed to sanction their racism, and from which they invoke support as if those were “legal rights.” They also attempt to conceal the defectiveness of such formulations by camouflaging them with misleading terms, such as “democracy,” “equality,” “tolerance,” and “coexistence.”

While on the subject of deception one can point to the many Israeli politicians, of all colors and hues, but most particularly those on the right, who proceeded to make visits to the supposedly bilingual school called “Hand in Hand” at Bayt Safafa. This school was subjected to an arson attack by the racist group Lehava on 30 November 2014, which left graffiti on its walls proclaiming: “No coexistence with cancer,” “Death to the Arabs,” and “Kahane was right.”1 This organization is dedicated to preventing Jewish women from marrying Palestinians, while brandishing its motto of “Jewish women for Jewish men.” They are a racist, Rightist organization. So those politicians came to the school, apparently surprised at what had happened, failing to understand that what occurred was a very natural consequence of incessant racist incitement against Palestinians, and of the widespread dissemination through Israeli public discourse of established prejudice against them, a prejudice that is no longer disguised in statements issued by the government or political parties in Israel. Although research institutes in Israel conduct advanced work in many areas, a high level of denial of reality nevertheless dominates Israeli society generally, and the ruling establishment particularly.

Five decades of colonial control have uncovered and made distinct a multitude of political and racist values as well as groups with multiple interests. Settlers who manage to steal land and find a government agency behind them to legalize that theft, and then to offer them protection and financial support, will surely come to believe in their racial superiority in practical terms, after having believed in it in ideological and religious terms. The Israeli colonial project has moved from the phase of being concerned with seizing control of the

land, and slowly gnawing away at more of it, to the phase of the theoretical legalization of colonial thinking, digging into ancient and modern history to support its myths. This phase is taking place within the larger context of putting together the paperwork needed to support a racist system of apartheid.

How then are we to understand what has happened in Jerusalem during the past year? Is it the result of the horrible murder of the child Mohammed Abu Khdeir? Or of increased pressure on the al-Aqsa mosque? Or settler voracity that has extended into the very heart of Palestinian Jerusalem?

Certainly all the above played an important role in what the city and its suburbs have experienced, but it is not enough to explain what has taken place over the past year, which has involved various neighborhoods of Jerusalem. Examining the socio-economic context will help give a clearer picture. Doubtless this will complement the national-political context of liberation, and cannot to be seen as separate from it. Likewise, it is inseparable from the religious dimension that is gradually turning into a central feature of the conflict, particularly in Jerusalem, a city that encompasses the al-Aqsa mosque. And of course, these can never be separated from the overarching question of Palestine: blocked horizons, the war on Gaza, the failed attempts at reconciliation between Fatah and Hamas, the economic and social problems of Palestinian society, and ongoing political and economic developments.

 

Annexation and Economic Marginalization

 

The 1967 conquest of Jerusalem did not affect the city’s economy any differently than it did the economy of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, despite the fact that Israeli law was imposed on Jerusalem while Israeli military rule was imposed on the rest of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. The fragile economies of the occupied territories collapsed in face of the relatively advanced Israeli capitalist economy. As a result of Israel’s victory in the war, its seizing control of vast areas of Egyptian, Palestinian, and Syrian territory, the expansion of global capitalism in the 1970s, and the huge growth of the tourism industry, Israel’s economy grew at an accelerated rate. This created a need for cheap labor, which was amply supplied by Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza. Cheap Palestinian hired labor in Israel’s workshops and in agriculture led to a decline in production in the occupied territories, transforming them gradually not only into sources of cheap labor but also to markets for Israeli consumer products. These changes had a long-term effect on land use, specifically in the West Bank, where paid labor became more lucrative than working on the land or in small industries. Further, Palestinian products could not rival their Israeli counterparts, so small and medium-sized industries also collapsed.

These changes had more dramatic effects in Jerusalem than in the rest of the occupied territories, because the city’s economy historically depended on services, trade, and tourism, sectors over which Israel was quick to take direct control following the occupation. The rule of occupation took over all Arab public and municipal institutions, incorporating them into the corresponding institutions in West Jerusalem. The Arab (Jordanian) Jerusalem Governorate (amana) was dissolved, and all branches of the Jerusalem municipality were

incorporated into the Israeli municipality, with Israelis appointed to administer them. Bit by bit, Israel sought to dismantle Palestinian institutions in the city by drying up their funding, subjecting them to strict monitoring, and transferring various services to Israeli organizations. The crowning achievement of this policy was inclusion of the inhabitants of Jerusalem in the Israeli social security (national insurance) and the health insurance systems. Joining the social security and health systems was not a matter of choice; it was made compulsory, and remains so until today. This further bound the Palestinians of Jerusalem to the Israeli social services system, so that thousands of qualified Palestinians lost their jobs as a result. Most dangerous of all, however, was the political dimension of this annexation, since it makes disengaging the two sectors of the city a very difficult operation, one that was gradually made so intricate and complex to the point of becoming impossible.

What interests us here is understanding where matters stand at this point in time, and explaining the tragic conditions in which the Palestinians of Jerusalem are living. The Association for Civil Rights in Israel has published its 2014 report, which states that three-fourths of the inhabitants of East Jerusalem live below the poverty line.2 This comes as no surprise to any observer of the gradually deteriorating conditions of the city. It was possible to predict this fact when it became known that 40 percent of Jerusalem’s Palestinian students do not complete their education, flocking instead to a job market that is open to cheap unskilled labor with short-term work opportunities that often lead to long- term unemployment.3 It appears that the poverty rate for Arab Jerusalem enjoys a degree of stability; the National Insurance Institute of Israel affirmed in 2011 that 79.5 percent of the city’s Palestinian inhabitants live below the poverty line,4 a rate almost identical to the figure for 2104, whereas the cost of living in Israel is rapidly rising at rates higher than the rate of wage increases for Jerusalem’s Arab population. It gets worse with Jerusalem’s children, 85 percent of whom belong to families living below the poverty line.

According to a 2011 study published by the Jerusalem-based institute al-Maqdese for Society Development, since 1999 around 5,000 economic establishments, mostly engaged in trade, were shut down.5 A number of these were located in the Old City. The industrial sector has been in such rapid recession that it no longer constitutes a significant portion of Jerusalem’s economy. Other sectors, such as services and tourism, have also suffered recession, as will be discussed later.

Of course there are multiple reasons for this recession, yet a central one is the isolation of Jerusalem. The number of shoppers in the city has been approximately halved as a result of the construction of the racist separation wall, which has had a catastrophic effect on Jerusalem’s economy.6 Adding to Jerusalem’s economic woes is the obvious disparity in prices between Jerusalem’s markets and those in the West Bank, which surround the city on all sides. This drives Jerusalem’s shoppers to West Bank markets. It is important to recall that the Jerusalem market suffers from high costs primarily due to having been linked to Israel’s economy, and to being made subject to higher taxes in comparison with West Bank markets.

Due to the cultural and religious significance of the city, tourism, both international and local, is one of the important economic sectors in the eastern part of Jerusalem. Taking together all its various components, this sector constitutes nearly 40 percent of

Jerusalem’s total economy. Israeli settlement activity in and around Jerusalem has affected the tourism sector in many ways and contributed significantly to the recession of the tourism sector. Among these is settlers’ seizure of land needed for the construction of hotels and tourist resorts; settlers’ control over archaeological and historical sites; Israeli control of crossing points and the movement of tourists; and the restrictions Israel imposes on tourist activity in the West Bank, including Jerusalem.7 Of course political instability and uncertain security conditions hang permanently like a sword over the head of the tourism sector. After every intifada or war on Gaza or Lebanon, this sector is dealt a hard blow the effects of which continue for an entire year at the lowest estimate. Recovery is barely complete before a new blow is struck.

Preparations for the millennium in 2000 involving huge investments may be seen as an example of what this sector endures. Palestinian companies readied themselves to greet the third millennium, borrowing huge amounts of money from Israeli banks to purchase new buses to accommodate the great surge of visitors and pilgrims expected to come to Jerusalem for the celebrations. But the second millennium came to an end with the intifada. Tourism came to an almost complete standstill. The banks began to demand that the tourist transport companies repay their loans, while the new buses depreciated in value before ever having been used. In mid-2002, these numbered 220 tourism vehicles, and with the companies’ inability to repay their loans more than 70 of these buses were sold, some at auction for a pittance, after the banks had taken possession of them. So the number of tourist buses dropped below 60. Furthermore Israeli competition in the tourism sector is brutal: the Israelis dominate all the capabilities of this market. Israeli tourism companies are in full control of large tour operators, deciding where they lodge, what they visit, where they shop, and where they eat. Thus all that is left for Arab Jerusalem are the crumbs.

Hotels and hotel rooms may be used as another gauge of what Jerusalem tourism has been reduced to, regardless of the rate of occupancy, seasonal occupancy, and the successive misfortunes suffered by Jerusalem hotels. This can be seen from the following table:

 

Table 1: Number of Hotels and Hotel Rooms in Jerusalem8

 

Year

No. of Hotels

No. of Rooms

2000

43

1,997

2001

29

836

2002

21

915

2003

20

907

2004

23

985

2005

18

867

2006

22

1,209

2007

25

1,249

2008

29

1,317

2009

34

1,580

It should be noted that the number of hotel rooms in Jerusalem in the year 1966 had risen to as high as 2,200. This does not only indicate that practically no new hotels were built after 1967; it also shows that the number of rooms decreased noticeably. Some hotels were closed down, and only one new hotel was built after 1967, the 60-room Addar Hotel. Meanwhile, Israelis have established more than 2,000 hotel rooms in Arab Jerusalem since 1967, and there are plans to build a similar number in existing and future settlements in Jerusalem.

The other problem Jerusalem hotels are facing is competition from Bethlehem hotels, which charge a rate of U.S.$30 per night, sometimes even less. Because operational costs in Jerusalem are so high, rising almost as high as those of Israeli hotels, the ability to compete against Bethlehem hotels has been all but lost.

In brief, Jerusalem’s economy is linked to a number of factors that have shaped and influenced it. These are mostly negative factors, and may be summarized as follows:

 

  • Settlement activity and the wall, the economic effects of which will be discussed below.

  • The nature of the Israeli job market, which seeks unskilled labor, especially in the sectors of janitorial or cleaning services, construction, and transport. The Israeli job market offers low-paying jobs requiring no professional or technical skills. These are temporary jobs for the most part, so that the worker regularly moves from one job to the next.

  • The loss of industrial workshops to the extent that no industrial area is left in Arab

    Jerusalem. What remains of the industrial area in Wadi al-Jawz has been given over to car repair shops, and even these are decreasing in number as the entire area is changing into a market for foodstuffs and construction materials. As for the second industrial area in the village of ‘Anata, which neighbors Jerusalem, that too has been given over to car repair shops, and the racist separation wall now completely severs it from Jerusalem.

  • The lack of national banks in Jerusalem. Israeli banks do not grant developmental

    loans to Palestinians for lack of guarantees sufficient to meet their requirements. Furthermore, the Palestinian investor fears that these banks will seize their facilities or real estate holdings should they fail to repay their loans, and thus their property will end up in the hands of settlers. Financing poses a serious problem for Jerusalem investors, one for which no solution has yet been found.

  • The decline in the standard of education, which is regarded as the lifeblood of economic

    growth and development.

     

    Settlement Activity and Control over the Land

     

    Land is national and private capital, and a central foundation of economic development. Only around 13 percent of the area of their city remains for the Palestinian population of Jerusalem. This has cost them a major resource for economic development and growth, in addition to the loss of other resources that have been marginalized, annexed, or

    otherwise blatantly turned over to the settlers or the state of Israel to exploit.9 Notably, the settlements have usurped over 35 percent of land in East Jerusalem, that is, almost three times the land allocated to Palestinians. Of course these figures are not entirely accurate, since they do not account for settler infiltration into Palestinian neighborhoods such as Shaykh Jarrah, Silwan, Ras al-‘Amud, al-Tur (Mount of Olives), and the Old City. The remaining land is divided into two parts: the first is given to infrastructure and parks, comprising nearly 22 percent; the second comprises 30 percent of East Jerusalem land that has not yet been zoned. This does not mean that it will not go to the settlers, or held in reserve for future settlements that will contribute to the realization of the aim of seizing the whole of Jerusalem. That is a certainty, given what can be understood from Israeli schemes to ensure that these lands will never belong to Palestinians, no matter how dire their situation might become. Thus economic development in the city is assured through land for settlers, and will never serve the interests of Palestinian investors. Even if we assume, for the sake of argument, that there are Palestinian investors who are willing to invest in Jerusalem despite its complicated and discouraging conditions, and that they desire to invest in building a new hotel: where will they find land on which to build? And should such land be found, its cost would be unaffordable and prohibitive to investment. We will not discuss settlement activity and its infrastructure in Jerusalem, since these have been dealt with in many detailed studies. The socioeconomic effect of the settlements on Jerusalem has been, suffice it to say, immense. For in addition to the policy of land grabbing, they have impoverished Jerusalem and its population, strangled its growth and development, and to a large extent destroyed its future. Jewish settlement activity has cut off all of Jerusalem’s connections, turning Palestinian neighborhoods into scattered

    enclaves, so that the social fabric of the city has been totally lost.

     

    The “Separation Wall” and Its Socioeconomic Effects

     

    The length of the wall in the district of Jerusalem has reached 142 kilometers, and in some areas it has penetrated as deeply as 14 kilometers into the West Bank (beyond the borders of the annexed municipality of Jerusalem). The wall has encompassed most settlements close to Jerusalem within the urban spread of the city. This means that it has de facto annexed these settlements to Israel, along with those that originally were constructed within the city’s municipal boundaries. The wall thus succeeded in isolating Jerusalem and its surroundings from the West Bank, and with the use of military checkpoints and barriers it has restricted the social, economic, and service-related connections of Jerusalem’s population with the West Bank, thereby placing the movements of the inhabitants of Jerusalem fully under its control. It further excluded some Palestinian neighborhoods – such as Kafr ‘Aqab and Shu‘fat refugee camp – so that “legally” they were kept within Israeli Jerusalem’s municipal boundaries, in spite of the total absence of municipal services in those neighborhoods. They thus became in effect part of the West Bank, and it is possible to say that they became areas with no responsible authority, were illegal and unregulated codes prevail.

    The wall restricts population movement, so that an inhabitant of Jerusalem who needs to pass through the checkpoints on a daily basis spends an average of three to four hours just to cross. This is a drain of time, money, and energy, in addition to the daily provocation and humiliation entailed. We can only imagine the results of such a daily ordeal throughout the past twenty-one years. Most of Jerusalem’s college students study at the universities of Birzeit, al-Quds (in Abu Dis), and Bethlehem; these youngsters were born under the shadow of the wall, and must cross it daily. It is easy to guess how they must feel, and what their future political leanings will be.

    The wall has torn to shreds the urban social fabric of Jerusalem society. Not infrequently we find one half of a family living in al-Ram, Abu Dis, or Bir Nabala, or elsewhere, while the other half of the same family lives behind the wall. Furthermore, Jerusalem has lost its rural surroundings, along with the capability to fill its breadbasket, and its consumer capacity, both of which intensify the Jerusalem market’s subordination to Israeli producers.10 The wall has swallowed up vast swathes of land that comprised the rural reserves of Arab Jerusalem, the space for its urban expansion, thereby imposing on it geopolitical facts on the ground. Productive markets disintegrated, new markets emerged, and the wall changed the relationship between human beings and their habitat, and deepened the alienation of Palestinians from their environment.11

    The construction of the wall led to long-term effects on the quality of goods that are traded in the city’s markets and to an obvious decline of trade in Jerusalem’s products, in addition to diminishing of its social role. The wall struck a hard blow to Jerusalem’s economy, in which trade takes second place after tourism.12 A large number of shops shuttered their doors, especially in the southern markets, such as the spice and perfumes (‘attarin) market, the butchers’ (lahhamin) market, the textile (khawajat) and cotton (qattanin) markets offering traditional garments, and Bab al-Silsila’s antiques and souvenirs market. Even markets that used to be crowded with shoppers, such as Khan al- Zayt, are suffering from permanent stagnation. An increasing number of small tradesmen are joining the Israeli job market, now that their trades are failing to bring in even the lowest incomes.

    It is worth mentioning that Palestinians living in areas occupied in 1948 made energetic efforts to revive commerce in Jerusalem by organizing day trips to the city from Palestinian villages and towns inside Israel for shopping, as well as worshipping in the sacred precincts of the al-Aqsa mosque. These activities significantly reduced the suffering of Jerusalem traders, particularly in areas close to the al-Aqsa mosque, but they were not sufficient for the markets to recover. The same Palestinians also developed tourist travel to Jerusalem, Jericho, Bethlehem, and Ramallah for holidays and vacations, after increased subjection to racism at Israeli hotels and resorts led to diminishing interest in those destinations.

     

    The Decline in Living Conditions

     

    A study by the Israeli organization Ir Amim states that Palestinian population growth has created a need for a minimum of 1,500 housing units annually,13 while the number

    of permits granted for residential construction in the best and most active years does not exceed 400 units. This leads to overcrowding and homelessness in the city. Of course, the number of permits issued annually does not exceed a few dozen, and only rarely did the number actually reach 400. In some years the number does not exceed the number of Arab residential units that the occupation demolishes in Jerusalem. For example, between 2000 and 2010 a total of 839 buildings were demolished, with the peak occurring in 2004 when 133 buildings were destroyed (see Table 2).14

     

    Table 2: Arab Buildings Destroyed

    by Israeli Authorities in East Jerusalem, 2000–2014

     

    Year

    No. of Buildings Demolished

    2000

    16

    2001

    41

    2002

    45

    2003

    99

    2004

    133

    2005

    90

    2006

    81

    2007

    75

    2008

    93

    2009

    84

    2010

    82

    2011

    48

    2012

    36

    2013

    84

    2014

    36

     

    The Israeli human rights organization B’Tselem reports that the number of those displaced or rendered homeless as a result of home demolitions in the ten years between 2004 and 2014 was 2,028 Palestinians, including 1,108 minors. The same organization states that 59 Palestinians demolished their own homes between 2008 and 2015 in order to avoid paying the exorbitant demolition costs the municipality would have charged them for the service.

    Israel persists in its policy of home demolition in Jerusalem, and because of the widespread popular resistance activity the city of Jerusalem witnessed in the second half of 2014, Israeli home demolitions increased. Israel’s minister of public security Yitzhak Aharonovich stated on 19 November 2014 that Israel will promptly demolish homes in Jerusalem as collective punishment for resistance.15

    The districts now lying outside the racist separation wall (for example, Kafr ‘Aqab) are the fastest growing of the Arab quarters of Jerusalem. This is because just one high-rise

    residential building can contain forty or more apartments, more than the number built in Jerusalem neighborhoods inside the wall in an entire year.

    Of course Jerusalem’s inhabitants are not waiting for a magical solution. They have to build homes for themselves in any way possible. Since there is no land available they have to devise other solutions, such as subdividing existing apartments into smaller ones, randomly adding what can be added to existing structures, and building around an existing house by sacrificing the surrounding garden. All the specialists in Jerusalem agree that the number of unlicensed dwellings is in the vicinity of twenty thousand residential units. Assuming that each family consists of only five people, that means that there are 100,000 Palestinians living in unlicensed homes, which in turn means that the threat of home demolition permanently hangs over their heads, and they can never know when the occupation’s bulldozer will arrive to destroy their home. The psycho-social dimensions of such a situation have a tremendous effect on people’s lives.

    This process has resulted in entire districts of squatter areas, so that it is possible to say that these now constitute three-quarters of Jerusalem’s Palestinian neighborhoods. If we link this to the rate of poverty, which is over 78 percent, we get a clear picture of where matters now stand. All the ills associated with poverty worldwide are taking root in these districts: general violence, domestic violence, early school truancy, drug use, social alienation, and others. The housing crisis, cramped living space, and inability to purchase or rent homes has resulted a decline in the birth rate, so that the average family size in the district of Jerusalem was 4.7 members in 2010, compared with 5.7 members in 2005.16 Naturally there is a difference between those living within the wall and those living outside it. Since the statistics available are for the entire district of Jerusalem, which includes parts of the West Bank where housing conditions are very different and family size is larger, it is possible to say that the average size of the Jerusalem family living within the wall is less than 4.5 members.

    The fact that many families in Jerusalem are compelled to share an apartment with newlywed sons, and that those newlyweds have to live with their parents, is causing the Jerusalem family to regress to where it had been decades ago. It also runs counter to the nature of socio-economic development, since it revives the extended family, which had almost disappeared in the 1970s. This has a regressive effect on Jerusalem society, over and above its effect on psychosocial wellbeing.

     

    Residency Requirements

     

    Permanent residence – held by Palestinian residents of Jerusalem – is completely different from citizenship. Israeli regulations have made clear distinctions between the two,17 with permanent residency rights contingent on the approval of the Israeli ministry of the interior, thus acting as a sword hanging over the heads of Jerusalem’s Palestinian inhabitants. These regulations restrict their freedom of movement, and make any kind of socio-economic development impossible.18 For example, young men and women in Jerusalem have to think long and hard before marrying. If a young man marries a West

    Bank resident, he assures himself endless suffering. And an inhabitant of Jerusalem dares not leave Jerusalem to reside in the West Bank, often just a few meters away from the municipal boundaries of Jerusalem (as delineated by the occupation), to avoid having his “center of life” determined to exist outside Jerusalem: that would lead to his being stripped of his right to reside in the city. And since the means of livelihood in the city have been limited to the narrowest extent, a number of Jerusalem’s inhabitants have sought their livelihood outside Palestine. But should they stay away longer than seven years, they are liable to being stripped of their right to Jerusalem residency, as well as their right to reside anywhere in Palestine, including in the areas subject to the Palestinian Authority, since they will be denied re-entry into Palestine.19 The Israeli ministry of the interior keeps constant and close watch over Jerusalem inhabitants – particularly in this digital age when citizens cannot conceal their movements – investigating and verifying their “center of life” whenever they:

     

  • register a newborn, regardless of whether the parents are inhabitants of Jerusalem, or one is from Jerusalem while the other resides in the area governed by the Palestinian Authority, or whether the child was born outside Palestine due to reasons of work, study, or anything else;

  • obtain an identity card for the first time, or replace a damaged or lost identity card;

  • make any changes to an identity card, such as a change of address or marital status;

  • apply for travel documentation (laissez-passer);

  • cross borders, whether via Jordan or through Tel Aviv (Lydda) Airport;

  • apply for health insurance;

  • apply for social security (national insurance); or

  • apply for a pension.20

     

    As part of the policy of suppressing Jerusalem’s inhabitants, restricting their freedoms, and getting rid of the largest possible number of them, the regulations governing family reunification are invoked. A Jerusalem woman married to a man residing in the West Bank is only allowed to apply for family reunification after her husband attains the age of 35 years, and before she reaches 25 years of age. The same regulation applies to a Jerusalem man married to a young woman from the West Bank.21 Thus, there are thousands of families that suffer great hardships. Children suffer as a result of not being registered in their parents’ identity card, and must endure the consequences of such a situation when one of their parents needs to reside in Jerusalem while the other has to reside in the West Bank. Even if the parents succeed in finding an apartment in one of the “lost districts” behind the wall,22 one of them will have to pass through the abhorrent checkpoints on a daily basis. Around ten thousand Palestinian children in Jerusalem are estimated to be unregistered in their parents’ identity cards due to an uncertain “legal status” (meaning their right to reside in Jerusalem), because one of the parents does not possess a Jerusalem identity card.23

    During the past few years of occupation, more than fifteen thousand Palestinians have had their right to reside in Jerusalem revoked by Israel. This figure does not include

    the tens of thousands of Jerusalem citizens who have been denied the right of return to the city following the war of 1967 because they were outside of Palestine, or even in the West Bank, during the war. Nor does the figure include those who were exiled for political reasons. The policy of stripping away the right of residence reached its peak in 2008, when the number of those who were denied this right reached 4,577 Palestinians, or one-third of the total number for the years for which we have statistics. The number for 2006 was around 1,363 Palestinians, 1,067 for the year 2007.24

    Most disturbing to the Palestinian inhabitants of Jerusalem, and a criminal violation of their human rights, is that their presence in the city depends on Israel’s good will and charity, rather than deriving from their natural rights. They are temporary residents, at the mercy of the Israeli authorities who can expel them and, either temporarily or permanently, strip them of their right to live in their own home. In 2010 and 2011, Israel deported three members of the Palestinian Parliament from their city of Jerusalem to the West Bank.25 More recently, Daoud al-Ghoul, development coordinator for the Health Work Committees, was banished from Jerusalem for five months, and from the West Bank for six. This ban was recently renewed for a second term. To the best of my knowledge, this is the first case of an inhabitant of Jerusalem being banished from the entire West Bank. The occupation authorities usually either deport Jerusalem residents outside Palestine, or forbid them entry to the West Bank and impose compulsory residence on them.26 Deporting them outside the West Bank, however, is a new phenomenon, hitherto unknown, which has forced Daoud al-Ghoul to take up residence in Haifa.27

     

    Closing Down Institutions

     

    After state and municipal institutions were subsumed by Israeli institutions following the 1967 war, Jerusalem society proceeded to develop civil society institutions to provide the essential services needed to stand fast and resist the imposed annexation. The Palestinians of Jerusalem grew to depend on these institutions in various areas: education, health, culture, sports and youth affairs, and social services. The occupation regime perpetually harassed Jerusalem’s institutions by temporarily closing them down for periods ranging from three to twelve months, after which they would re-open. It also harassed the heads of the institutions, who formed a major cadre of Palestinian leadership prior to the Oslo accords. The role of the late Faisal Husseini and Orient House comes immediately to mind, but one should also acknowledge the part played by professional and labor unions, the press, and women’s associations when evaluating the role civil society played in preserving the relative independence of Jerusalem society from the Israeli establishment. It is true that this applied to all the occupied territories prior to Oslo, but the phenomenon was deeper and more obvious in Jerusalem, considering Israel’s systematic annexation in the city and the difference between it and the other occupied territories with respect to legal status.

    Following the establishment of the Palestinian Authority in 1994, the campaign to suppress Jerusalem’s institutions intensified. To a large extent this was accompanied

    by closing off Jerusalem to Palestinians through setting up checkpoints on the roads connecting the city with the other regions of the West Bank, and through Israel’s issuance of a decree barring West Bank and Gaza residents from entering Jerusalem (in accordance with the decree regulating entry into Israel) without a permit issued either by Israel’s civil or military administrations.28 The suppression of institutions took various forms, including:

     

  • Charging them with failing to abide by Israeli regulations for the management of non-governmental organizations;

  • charging them with receiving support from the Palestinian Authority, or being in contact with hostile parties;

  • charging them with organizing activities opposed to Israel;

  • imposing multiple taxes on them with the aim of driving them into bankruptcy.

 

The so-called minister of public security would issue a decree closing down an institution for a year, and would then renew the closure every year. Such was the fate of many of Jerusalem’s institutions, being closed down either by decree of the occupation authorities or as a result of the lack of funding. Many institutions also moved to the West Bank, and to Ramallah in particular, because of Israel’s policies of suppression, the difficulty of operating within Jerusalem, and the near impossibility of maintaining ties with the rest of the West Bank. Between 2000 and 2014, Israel issued orders to close around forty of Jerusalem’s institutions, with Orient House, the Palestinian Chamber of Commerce, and the Arab Higher Council for Tourism topping the list, along with many other institutions working in development, youth and social affairs, and sports.29 With the closure of these institutions, Jerusalem lost thousands of job opportunities as well as an important part of its independence from the Israeli establishment, facilitating the process of eating up the city. It is worth noting that loss at the level of national character and identity is no less painful than other losses. The closure of Jerusalem’s institutions also eliminated opportunities for the emergence of national and social leaders, as well as part of Jerusalem’s Palestinians’ capacity to initiate action and strike back against the occupation, to resist it and oppose its regulatory measures.

 

Education

 

In 2014, there were around ten thousand Palestinian children in Jerusalem without schools.30 This does not mean that those children are out in the streets, although a portion of them would be. West Bank schools managed to absorb them, since Jerusalem schools have very limited capacity. Two-thirds of Jerusalem’s Palestinian pupils are now studying at schools run by the Israeli establishment. This has a far-reaching effect on national identity. Nor is it certain that these children are enjoying reasonable learning opportunities: most of them will eventually drop out of school at one stage or the other. It must be said that a high proportion of Jerusalem’s pupils attend schools where the Israeli municipality of Jerusalem entrusts the process of education to contractors because it is

unable, or more accurately unwilling, to provide sufficient schools. Learning conditions suffer in unsuitable buildings and with heavy reliance on retired or unqualified teachers. Hence the greater part of those pupils will turn to the Israeli job market at an early age, with less than modest educational attainment.

Much has been written about education in Jerusalem and the challenges that the youth of the city face in preserving their national identity. More than half of them do not receive even the minimum amount of instruction in civics that students typically receive the world over. Israel has expunged many components of the Palestinian curriculum taught in Jerusalem and stripped it of all national dimensions. Furthermore, conditions in many schools are off-putting and discouraging to students. Instead of a lengthy exposition on the state of education in Palestinian Jerusalem, it may be enough to say that 3,055 classrooms are needed to meet the city’s needs.31 This alone should be cause for nation- wide concern about the future of Jerusalem’s youth.32

 

New Laws: Raising the Level of Suppression

 

New laws are being legislated and old ones activated in order to increase the pressure on Jerusalem’s Palestinian residents and to intensify their suppression. A great number of surveillance cameras are now spread over all parts of Arab Jerusalem. These are no longer limited to the Old City, as they had been more than a decade ago; surveillance cameras are now being installed in most of the city’s Palestinian neighborhoods and its various streets and intersections, so that the residents of Jerusalem are now constantly under observation, from the minute they leave their homes until they return to them.

Also underway is the activation of, or rather threats of activating, the law of absentee property. This law was issued in 1950 with the aim of appropriating the property of Palestinians who were expelled or fled in 1948, leaving behind their homes, lands, and personal property.33 After 1967, the law was applied to territory annexed by Israel, especially the eastern sector of Jerusalem. There, Israel began to confiscate the property of Jerusalemites whose place of residence had been found to be outside Palestine. The novelty was in the attempt to apply this law to property in Jerusalem owned by West Bank residents. Let us assume that an Abu Dis resident owns a plot of land or a building in the western part of Abu Dis, which was annexed to Jerusalem after 1967: his property would now be classified as absentee property, even if he resides only a few meters away from it. The issue of the law of absentee property was raised once again in 2004, when some residents of Bethlehem and Bayt Jala appealed to the Israeli courts to be allowed access to land they owned that was swallowed up by the racist separation wall. They were informed that their land was appropriated because it was absentee property, and hence was placed under the authority of the guardian of absentee property. This alerted people to Israel’s intention to apply the law of absentee property in Jerusalem when the absentees in such cases were West Bank residents. Large swathes of privately-owned land belonging to Bayt Sahur residents were also appropriated for the purpose of building the settlement

of Har Homa on Jabal Abu Ghunaym.

Israel has temporarily halted the use of the law of absentee property, since it is able to exploit other regulations to the same effect. This does not mean that the law has been abrogated; rather, it should be regarded as a serious threat to thousands of real estate holdings in Jerusalem. It should be recalled that much real estate in Jerusalem is collectively owned by multiple family members and was never divided among the heirs. In many of these cases, one or more of the heirs resides outside Palestine and owns shares of the family legacy. If the law of absentee property is implemented, those shares will be turned over to the guardian of absentee property, who can dispose of them as he wishes. In the past this “guardian” has transferred the ownership of real estate in the Old City to settler associations, and allotted other land to the building of settlements.34

The Shepherd Hotel in Shaykh Jarrah is a good example. The hotel consists of a historic building belonging to the late Palestinian leader Hajj Amin al-Husseini. Israel seized it in 1967, and despite the fact that Hajj Amin’s heirs continue to live in Jerusalem, the guardian of absentee property sold the building to a settlement company that is converting it to a residential complex consisting of twenty housing units for Jewish settlers. Construction began in 2011.35 The Husseini family attempted to challenge this venture in the Israeli courts but did not succeed, their efforts yielding no results. A similar case is the house of ‘Abd al-Qadir al-Husseini, located only a few steps away from Orient House, which was also appropriated in 1967 on the pretext that it is absentee property, despite his son Faisal’s presence in the city.

With respect to settlement construction, the Israeli cabinet formed a three-member “Committee for the Completion of Plans,” made up of one representative each from the Israeli Ministry of the Interior, the Regional Planning and Building Committee, and the District Planning and Building Committee. The purpose of this was to push for the approval of the largest possible number of settlement projects in Jerusalem prior to the March 2015 general elections. The aim was to create many facts on the ground before any political changes could take place. The plans presented to the committee included various settlements in Jerusalem and its environs. The formation of this committee reveals not only settler voracity, but also the disposition of the major players in the coalition government, and its intention to inflict collective punishment on the Palestinian residents of Jerusalem.36 In addition, the second half of 2014 saw a bundle of racist bills put before the Knesset all of which aim at tightening control over Palestinians living in Israel and Jerusalem.37 One of these, referred to as the law for “the Judaizing of state and citizenship,” may be seen as the epitome of racist legislation and has become a subject of political debate in Israel.

In a different context, Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, stated on 22 November 2014 that he would propose legislation aimed at stripping Jerusalem residents of their residency rights, and revoking all social benefits for those who commit acts against Israel.38 There is also the law of home demolition for Arabs who commit acts against Israeli security, the law against stone-throwing, the law allowing Jews to pray at the Temple Mount, and other laws under consideration, all of which aim at tightening control over Jerusalem.

Al-Aqsa Mosque: A Powder Keg

 

Confrontations between Palestinians and Israelis erupted before in Jerusalem and elsewhere because of an assault on the Noble Sanctuary, an extremely sensitive site over which sentiments run very high. It is also one of the last remaining Palestinian strongholds in Jerusalem, and the embodiment of many religious and national symbols. Israel followed its policy towards the Noble Sanctuary slowly and cautiously, piling up its gains through gradually taking control of the sacred precinct away from the Jerusalem waqf, so that now the Israeli police have total control over who is allowed to enter the Noble Sanctuary.

Visiting the Noble Sanctuary never presented a problem in the past, despite the recurrent assaults on it in the 1970s and 1980s. Attacks were individual occurrences, including the arson attack on the al-Aqsa mosque in 1969, attacks on the Dome of the Rock, and the discovery of explosives in different parts of the sacred precinct. The problem rose to the surface when dedicated Zionist movements and groups were formed, loudly proclaiming their call for demolishing the al-Aqsa mosque and building the Jewish Temple in its place. Even this was not seen as posing a direct threat to the Noble Sanctuary, since the waqf did not close the sacred precinct to Jewish visitors. However the problem gradually escalated, with encouragement from the ruling establishment. This became manifest with Ariel Sharon’s visit to the Noble Sanctuary in 2000, whereby official policy brought the sacred precinct to the center of the conflict, furthering its use as a source of incitement in Israeli domestic politics. Additionally, continuing with archeological excavations and the digging of tunnels in the areas surrounding the Noble Sanctuary, and charging settler groups with the task of managing nearby archaeological sites, contributed to putting the Noble Sanctuary in truly imminent danger.

For three years now, Jewish “visits” to the sacred precinct have not had a touristic character. They have become acts of provocation to Muslim sentiments regarding the site; they include attempts to conduct prayers there, along with making proclamations opposed to the existence of the sacred precinct. What made things even worse were the recurrent visits of members of the Israeli cabinet and the Knesset, who delivered incendiary statements about the future of the Noble Sanctuary and the right of the Jews to return to the “Temple Mount.” These were accompanied by religious opinions uttered by many rabbis sanctioning such activities and aspirations. Now there are dedicated groups, not far removed from the Israeli cabinet and its coalition – in fact rather representative of them

– who are organizing “visits” with government support and under tight guard by heavily armed Israeli police and border guards. These occur regularly, with some groups even visiting the Noble Sanctuary more than once a day in order to create the impression of a continuous and permanent Jewish presence.39 During these visits, the police and border guards commit acts meant to provoke worshippers and students in the courtyards of the Noble Sanctuary. A recent development is the appearance of a clear agenda, officially and openly backed by the Israeli government, for discussing the sharing of time and space at the sacred precinct, on the model of what was done at the Ibrahimi Sanctuary in Hebron.

In 2002, Israel announced that it would treat the plazas of the Haram area as “national parks,” with open access to all. The waqf would no longer have any authority over these spaces, its authority limited to roofed buildings only. This was in blatant violation of the historical status quo, which is that the Noble Sanctuary comprises 144 dunams including its outer walls, gates, all structures within it and beneath its ground, all its yards and gardens, and all buildings overlooking it from the northern and western sides, since all these were waqf holdings. The waqf administrators declared this time and again, referring in various statements to the clear stipulations of British Mandate regulations.40

Conversely, Israel tightened its grip on the Noble Sanctuary, taking complete control of all activity within it and all aspects of entrance to it, including who is allowed to enter, at what times, and through which entrances. Large groups were denied entry into the sacred precinct and forbidden from praying within it at certain times. Palestinian guards were subjected to harassment and waqf authorities were not allowed to bring anything into the sacred precinct – not a book or a computer or a bag of cement – without a permit from the Israeli police, who rule over the location like absolute lords. There is a continuous concentrated presence of heavily armed police and border guards at the gates to the sacred precinct and in its open spaces. Despite this, the southern, covered part of the al-Aqsa mosque was broken into on 5 November 2014 and smoke bombs, tear gas canisters, and concussion bombs were set off within it, desecrations that had never taken place before.41 This assault further provoked the feelings of the residents of Jerusalem. Israel misread the situation at the Noble Sanctuary, failing to understand its effect on Palestinians and Arabs generally, and underestimating the feelings aroused. There is definitely a strong link between popular action in Jerusalem and what goes on at the Noble Sanctuary. As long as Israel adheres to its present policy, the sacred precinct will remain a cause of further confrontation between the Palestinians and Israel. It is true that there are now Israeli voices calling for restraining the “Temple Mount” movements, and for preventing Knesset members and ministers from using the place for political purposes. These voices were raised in response to the attempted assassination of the extremist Rabbi Yehuda Glick on 29 October 2014,42 and the attack on the synagogue of the settlement of Har Nof on 18 November 2014.43 Among those calling for calm was the prime minister, Netanyahu, who had been pressured by the European Union and the United States.

European reaction in this case went beyond its typical response,44 and Jordan withdrew its ambassador from Tel Aviv and lodged a complaint with the UN Security Council.45

 

Two Separate Cities

 

The Israelis are once more discovering, after 47 years, that annexing the eastern half of Jerusalem to the western half was a total delusion. They could neither dominate the city nor unite it. The city remains Palestinian Arab in essence, appearance, and identity. A quick look at Jerusalem suffices to reveal that outwardly there are two cities, living apart; the services that are shared do not conceal essential differences. A look at the Israeli yearbook of statistics also reveals huge differences in services, infrastructures, education,

health and cultural services, and public parks. The difference in urban expansion and residential construction grows ever wider.46 The contrast, which the residents of Jerusalem experience daily, has become, in principle, unacceptable. Most of East Jerusalem has come to resemble a shantytown, or is rapidly turning into one. Yet despite this, the settlers continue to fight for it. Meanwhile West Jerusalem is a modern city, developing every day.

For over a year, Jerusalem has occupied a good share of the news. Since the murder of sixteen-year-old Mohammed Abu Khdeir on 2 July 2014,47 militant action in various forms has been taking place in the different quarters of the city, despite the concentrated use of the numerous instruments of suppression that has extended to most neighborhoods and led to mass arrests that included children under the age of ten.48 These detentions continue at an increasing rate, so that not a day passes without mass arrests that sweep up women gathered in al-Aqsa mosque, youth leaders, and the families of fighters, including minors.49 So far the Israeli occupiers have failed to take complete control of Jerusalem. A series of security and political meetings have been held to that end, and measures taken that violate international law, including firing live bullets at people setting off firecrackers. Israeli news media talk incessantly about the situation, as if there were anything surprising in it, and proposing new forms of suppression that Israeli official agencies have started to discuss. Israeli leaders have loudly threatened the people of Jerusalem with collective punishment, which in fact has become a tangible, lived reality. Among such punishments are: accelerating the pattern of demolishing homes built without permits;50 arresting the families of stone-throwing children; demolishing the homes of those who launch guerrilla operations in Jerusalem; restricting the conditions for passing through the checkpoints between Jerusalem and the rest of the West Bank, through which nearly 100,000 residents of Jerusalem pass daily, so that these conditions have become more humiliating than before; giving traffic police a free hand to torment Jerusalem drivers for the most trivial reasons or for no reason at all; launching a vicious tax campaign in which the departments of the ministry of finance and the municipality conspire; and revoking the identity cards of Jerusalem residents and denying them their human and natural right to live in their city, the city of their ancestors.

One thing over which no discussion or debate has taken place among the Israeli security apparatus is seeing the current situation in Jerusalem as a result of almost five decades of Israeli occupation of the city – of neglect, marginalization, suppression, impoverishment, and diminishing services. The Israeli belief was that as long as the city’s Palestinians live under better conditions than those prevalent in the West Bank, they will accept their reality. This delusion has now been revealed. While it is true that the motivation for activism in Jerusalem, including the protection of the al-Aqsa mosque, is nationalist, this alone cannot adequately explain the months-long phenomenon without comprehending the socio-economic conditions that prevail in the city.

Finally, it is worth pointing out that despite the manifold mechanisms of expulsion employed by the occupation in Jerusalem to get rid of the maximum number of Palestinians, they now constitute nearly forty percent of the population of what is called “united Jerusalem,” when they had numbered under twenty percent in 1967. This important demographic fact will be one of the major factors in determining the future of the city.

Nazmi Jubeh is a professor of history and archaeology at Birzeit University and former co-director of Riwaq: Centre for Architectural Conservation.

 

Endnotes

  1. See: Muna al-Qawasimi, “Suwar: mutatarrifun yash‘alun al-nar bi-madrasa qarb Bayt Safafa” [Pictures: Extremists Set Fire to School near Bayt Safafa], PLS48.net, 30 November 2014, accessed 21 July 2015, online at www. pls48.net/?mod=articles&ID=1190685#. VaoHQSgmyNh; and “Nushata’ salam yatadhahirun ihtijajan ‘ala harq madrasa ‘Yadan bi-yad’ fi al-Quds” [Peace Activists Demonstrate to Protest the Burning of ‘Hand in Hand’ School in Jerusalem], al-Jabha, 7 December 2014, accessed 21 July 2015, online at www.aljabha. org/?i=88644.

  2. Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI), Situation Report: The State of Human Rights in Israel and the OPT, 2014 (Tel Aviv: ACRI, December 2014), 78, accessed 21 July 2015, online at www.acri.org.il/en/wp-content/ uploads/2014/12/Situation-Report-2014.pdf.

  3. See ACRI, Situation Report, 82–83; “Taqrir: 75% min al-maqdisiyyin tahta khatt al-faqr” [Report: 75% of Jerusalemites under the Poverty Line], al-Quds City, 13 May 2015, accessed 21 July 2015, online at alquds-online.org/index. php?s=news&cat=7&id=2374&skw.

  4. Israeli National Insurance Institute (NII), Poverty and Social Gaps: Annual Report, 2011, (Jerusalem: NII, November 2012), 10–17, accessed 21 July 2015, online at www.btl.gov. il/Englsih Homepage/Publications/Poverty_ Report/Documents/Poverty Report_2011.pdf.

  5. Al-Maqdese for Society Development, Palestinian Workers Rights in the Israeli Labour Market and Settlements (Jerusalem: al-Maqdese for Society Development, December 2011), 6, accessed 21 July 2015, online at www.al- maqdese.org/files/0000/0000/000000521.pdf.

  6. Azzam Abu Saud believes that the decline was around 40 percent. See Azzam Abu Saud, Athar al-‘azl ‘ala iqtisad al-Quds [The Effect of Isolation on the Economy of Jerusalem] (Jerusalem: Jerusalem Chamber of Commerce, 2010), 13.

  7. For the effect of settlement activity and the racist separation wall on tourism, see ‘Abd al-Qadir Ibrahim ‘Atiyya Hammad, “Ta’thir al- qita‘ al-istitani ‘ala al-qita‘ al-siyahi fi madinat al- Quds” [The Effect of Settlement Activity on the Tourism Sector in the City of Jerusalem],

    Wafa: Palestinian News and Info Agency, n.d., accessed 21 July 2015, online at www.wafainfo. ps/atemplate.aspx?id=3615.

  8. These figures come from Abu Saud, Athar al- ‘azl, 16.

  9. See Samir Abdallah, Ta’thir al-istitan ‘ala al- iqtisad fi al-Quds al-sharqiyya [The Effect of Settlement Activity on the Economy of East Jerusalem], a paper presented at a symposium on economic conditions in Jerusalem organized by the Department of Jerusalem Affairs on 19 January 2014, available online at alqudsgateway. ps/wp/?p=1132 (accessed 21 July 2015).

  10. See the proceedings of the symposium organized by the journal Shu’un Filastiniyya [The Journal of Palestinian Affairs] on 20 March 2014 titled ‘athar al-jidar al-‘unsuri ‘ala al-hayat al- iqtisadiyya wa al-ijtima‘iyya wa al-thaqafiyya fi al-Quds [The Effects of the Racist Wall on the Economic, Social, and Cultural Life of Jerusalem], published in Shu’un Filastiniyya 256 (Spring 2014): 100–133, online at www.shuun. ps/page-370-ar.html (accessed 21 July 2015).

  11. In its advisory opinion the International Court of Justice called for the dismantling of the wall and abrogating or abolishing all related legislation and regulations. See International Court of Justice, “Legal Consequences of the Construction of a Wall in the Occupied Palestinian Territory,” Advisory Opinion, 9 July 2004, accessed 21 July 2015, online at www.icj-cij.org/docket/ files/131/1671.pdf.

  12. For material relating to the effect of the racist separation wall on trade in Jerusalem, see Na’ila Juwaylis and Azzam Abu Saud, Athar jidar al-fasil al-‘unsuri ‘ala al-qita‘at al-iqtisadiyya al-mukhtalifa fi al-Quds al-‘Arabiyya [The Effects of the Racist Separation Wall on the Various Economic Sectors of Arab Jerusalem] (Jerusalem: Publications of the Arab Chamber of Commerce and Industry, 2010), 96.

  13. See Ir Amim, A Layman’s Guide to Home Demolitions in East Jerusalem (Jerusalem: Ir Amim, March 2009), 4, accessed 21 July 2015, online at www.ir-amim.org.il/en/report/ layman’s-guide-home-demolitions.

  14. United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs Occupied Palestinian Territory (OCHAoPt), East Jerusalem: Key Humanitarian Concerns, December 2011

    (Jerusalem: OCHAoPt, December 2011), accessed 21 July 2015, online at www.ochaopt. org/documents/ocha_opt_jerusalem_factsheet_ december_2011_english.pdf

  15. “Aharonovich: sanuwasil fi siyasat hadm al- manazil fi al-Quds” [Aharonovich: We Will Continue the Policy of Home Demolitions in Jerusalem], Huna al-Quds, 19 November 2014, accessed 21 July 2015, online at honaalquds.net/ ar/article/6797#.Vaoo5SgmyNg.

  16. Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, Ihsa’at al-Quds 2010 [Jerusalem Statistics 2010], 23.

  17. See the 1952 law governing entry into Israel, article 11.a.2 in particular, according to which the minister of the interior may “at his discretion

    . . . cancel any permit of residence granted under this Law.” See Law No. 5712-1952, Entry into Israel Law, accessed 22 July 2015, online at www.unodc.org/res/cld/document/ law-no--5712-1952--entry-into-israel-law_html/ Entry_Into_Israel_1952.pdf.

  18. For the different aspects of Israeli measures taken in Jerusalem, refer to the extensive study by Amir Cheshen, Bill Hutman, and Avi Melamed, Separate and Unequal: The Inside Story of Israeli Rule in East Jerusalem, (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1999).

  19. For ethnic cleansing and the use of multiple laws to restrict the right of Jerusalem inhabitants to reside in their city, see Nizar Ayyub, “al-Tathir al-‘irqi fi al-Quds” [The Ethnic Cleansing of Jerusalem], Hawliyyat al-Quds 13 (Summer 2012): 6–14.

  20. See Ahmad al-Ruwaydi and Nur Adkaydik, al- Ijra’at al-mafruda bi-khusus haqq al-iqama fi al-Quds [Imposed Regulations Concerning the Right of Residency in Jerusalem] (Jerusalem: Civic Coalition for Defending the Palestinians’ Rights in Jerusalem, February 2007), accessed 21 July 2015, online at civiccoalition-jerusalem. org/ar/system/files/know-your-rights-03.pdf.

  21. B’Tselem, Family Separation in East Jerusalem (Jerusalem: B’Tselem, 1 January 2011 [updated 20 August 2013]), accessed 21 July 2015, online at www.btselem.org/family_separation/ east_jerusalem#.

  22. Those districts belonging in principle to the municipality of Jerusalem and lying outside the racist separation wall, but in actual terms lacking all services and infrastructure, such as Kafr ‘Aqab, Ras Khamis, Dahiyat al-Salam, Shu‘fat refugee camp, and others.

  23. For Jerusalem residency and the imposed regulations and different conditions, see Ir Amim, Permanent Residency: A Temporary

    Status Set in Stone (Jerusalem: Ir Amim, 2012), online at www.ir-amim.org.il/sites/default/files/ permanent%20residency.pdf

  24. OCHAoPt, East Jerusalem. For complete data on the revocation of the right of residency see the table posted by B’Tselem, Statistics on Revocation of Residency in East Jerusalem (Jerusalem: B’Tselem, 11 January 2011 [updated 27 May 2015]), accessed 21 July 2015, online atwww.btselem.org/jerusalem/revocation_ statistics.

  25. Maha Salah, “Israel’s Arrest Campaign against Palestinian Parliamentarians,” Middle East Monitor, Briefing Paper, 8 February 2013, accessed 21 July 2015, online at www. middleeastmonitor.com/resources/briefing- papers/israelis-arrest-campaign-against- palestinian.pdf.

  26. The Jerusalem citizen ‘Abd al-Latif Ghayth has been languishing under compulsory residence for several years, and is being looked after by the present author. The order of compulsory residence is regularly renewed every six months. The last order he received was dated 15 March 2015, and included a ban on travel outside Palestine. See “Mukhabarat al-ihtilal tujaddad al-iqama al-jabariyya li-l-qiyadi ‘Abd al-Latif Ghayth” [Occupation Intelligence Renews House Arrest for the Leader ‘Abd al-Latif Ghayth], Filastin al-Yawm, 9 July 2015, accessed 21 July 2015, online at www.paltoday.ps/ar/post/231368.

  27. For updates on Daoud al-Ghoul, visit electronicintifada.net/tags/daoud-al-ghoul. Ghoul is a graduate student at al-Quds University who is writing his master’s thesis under the supervision of the present writer. For humanitarian cases directly and negatively affected by the residency policy see OCHAoPt, al-Quds al- sharqiyya: makhawuf ra’isa iza’ al-awda‘ al- insaniyya [East Jerusalem: Key Humanitarian Concerns] (Jerusalem: OCHAoPt, 2011), 14ff., accessed 21 July 2015, online at www.ochaopt. org/documents/ocha_opt_jerusalem_report_ 2011_3_23_web_arabic.pdf.

  28. United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs Occupied Palestinian Territory, www.ochaopt.org/documents/ jerusalem_report_arabic_web_sept07.pdf

  29. For the closing down of institutions, see Mazin al-Ja‘bari and Wafa’ Abu Ghush, al-Intihakat al-Isra’iliyya al-murtakiba bi haq al-mu’assasat al-maqdisiyya wa ighlaq Bayt al-Sharq [Israeli Violations against Jerusalem Institutions and the Closure of Orient House], (Jerusalem: 2013).

  30. See Reality of Palestinian Children’s Well-Being

    in Occupied East Jerusalem (Birzeit: Center for Continuing Education, 2014), 17.

  31. Ir Amim, Shortage of Classrooms in East Jerusalem: Annual Survey (Jerusalem: Ir Amim, August 2014), accessed 21 July 2015, online at www.ir-amim.org.il/sites/default/files/ education%20report%202014.pdf.

  32. For the condition of Jerusalem schools, see Samir Jubril, al-Ta‘lim fi al-Quds: waqi‘ wa tahaddiyat [Education in Jerusalem: Reality and Challenges] at: alqudsgateway.ps/wp/ wp-content/uploads/2014/02/05; Dima al- Samman, al-Ta‘lim fi al-Quds: tahaddin wa sumud [Education in Jerusalem: Challenge and Steadfastness], Ministry of Education, at www. pncecs.org/ar/reports/Report; the proceedings of the symposium on education in Jerusalem, organized by the journal Shu’un Filastiniyya [Palestinian Affairs] on 7 October 2012, at www.shuun.ps/page-359-ar.html. See also Mu’assasat al-Aqsa al-duwaliyya, al-ta‘lim fi al-Quds (Jerusalem: al-Aqsa Department of Communication and Information, 2010). As for early school truancy, see ‘Abd al-Rahman Abu ‘Arafa et al., al-Tasarrub al-madrasi fi madaris al-Quds al-sharqiyya: al-musabbabat wa al-dawafi‘ [School Truancy at East Jerusalem Schools: Causes and Motives] (Jerusalem: Multaqa al-fikr al-‘Arabi, 2012).

  33. See Michael R. Fischbach, Records of Dispossession: Palestinian Refugee Property and the Arab-Israeli Conflict (New York: Institute for Palestine Studies and Columbia University Press, 2003), 27–40.

  34. Ir Amim, Absentees against Their Will—Property Expropriation in East Jerusalem under the Absentee Property Law (Jerusalem: Ir Amim, 1 July 2010), accessed 21 July 2015, online at www.ir-amim.org.il/en/report/absentees- against-their-will-–-property-expropriation-east- jerusalem-under-absentee-property.

  35. Muhammad Mahir, “Mujamma‘ istaytani jadid fi qalb hayy al-Shaykh Jarrah bi-l-Quds al- muhtalla” [New Settler Encampment in the Heart of Shaykh Jarrah Neighborhood in Occupied Jerusalem], al-Yawm, 7 July 2009, accessed 21 July 2015, online at www.alyaum.com/ article/2688798.

  36. “Munadhammat al-tahrir: hakumat al-ihtilal tuqarr istikhdam aliya jadida li-tari‘ al-istaytan” [PLO: Occupation Government Establishes New Mechanism to Accelerate Settlement], Ma‘an, 15 December 2012, accessed 21 July 2015, online at maannews.net/Content.aspx?id=547985.

  37. On these laws, see Jerusalem Center for Legal

    Aid and Human Rights, “al-Tashri‘at al- Isra’iliyya tastahadaf Filastiniyyi al-dakhil wa al-Quds ‘ala haddin sawa’ al-knesset al-Isra’ili: qawanin ‘unsuriyya fi dawla tu‘tabar nafsahu ‘dimuqratiyya’” [Israeli Legislation Targeting Palestinians inside Israel and in Jerusalem Equally in the Israeli Knesset: Racist Laws in a State that Considers Itself “Democratic”], Haqq al-Awda 43 (15 May 2011), accessed 22 July 2015, online at www.badil.org/ar/publications-ar/ periodicals-ar/haqelawda-ar/item/1595.

  38. See B’Tselem, “Residency and Social Security Benefits Are Not a Favor the Authorities Can Bestow and Withdraw at Will,” press release, 23 November 2014, accessed 21 July 2015, online at www.btselem.org/press_releases/20141123_ revocation_of_residency.

  39. There are 22 officially registered groups active in organizing visits to the Noble Sanctuary. As such they are all sanctioned by the Israeli government. Some receive direct financial support from the state, while others receive it indirectly. In addition there are ten groups that are not officially registered. There is also a register of rabbis who have given religious opinions regarding the need to openly display Jewish religious mottos in the sacred precinct. We know the purport of these religious opinions. These groups have infiltrated the educational system, in addition to having links to a not insignificant number of Knesset members. For more information about these groups and their links to the cabinet and Israeli political parties, see Ir Amim, Dangerous Liaison: The Dynamics of the Rise of the Temple Movements and Their Implications (Jerusalem: Ir Amim, 1 March 2013), 17ff., accessed 21 July 2015, online at www.ir-amim.org.il/sites/default/ files/Dangerous%20Liaison_0.pdf.

  40. Nazmi al-Jubeh, “Bab al-Magharibah: Joha’s Nail in the Haram al-Sharif,” Jerusalem Quarterly File 18 (2003): 17–24.

  41. www.maannews. net/ a rb/ ViewDetails. aspx?ID=737648

  42. “Muhawilat ightiyal al-hakham al-mutatarrif Yehuda Glick bi-l-Quds wa isabatuhu harija” [Attempted Assassination and Critical Injury of Extremist Rabbi Yehuda Glick in Jerusalem], Ma‘an, 29 October 2014, accessed 21 July 2015, online at maannews.net/arb/ViewDetails. aspx?ID=736251. Yehuda Glick is a politi- cally extreme Israeli rabbi and a member of the Likud party. He is the president of the HaLiba organization, a coalition of movements aiming at building the Third Temple on the ruins of the Noble Sanctuary. Glick demands that Jews be

    allowed to exercise their “right to pray at the Temple Mount,” so he daily accompanies dif- ferent Jewish groups to the courtyards of the Noble Sanctuary, and he also used to organize similar “visits” for members of the cabinet and the Knesset and other important personages in Israeli society, with the purpose of convincing them of his point of view. See Wadi‘ ‘Awawida, “Yehuda Glick . . . ra’s harbat bina’ ‘al-haykal al-thalith’” [Yehuda Glick: Spearheading Con- struction of the “Third Temple”], al-Jazeera.net, 30 October 2014, accessed 21 July 2015, online at www.bit.ly/1DPTxiq.

  43. “Maqtal 5 Isra’iliyyin wa jarh 7 bi-hujum ‘ala kanis fi al-quds (video + suwar)” [Killing of 5 Israelis and Wounding of 7 in Attack on Synagogue in Jerusalem (Video and Pictures)], Russia Today, 18 November 2014, accessed 21 July 2015, online at arabic.rt.com/news/765131.

  44. This was the first time a European document was leaked to the Israeli press. It put red lines for Israel and the settlements in Jerusalem and its environs. See Peter Beaumont, “Jerusalem at Boiling Point of Polarisation and Violence – EU Report,” Guardian, 20 March 2015, accessed 21 July 2015, online at www.theguardian.com/ world/2015/mar/20/jerusalem-at-boiling-point- of-polarisation-and-violence-eu-report. It would appear that the document began to be drafted when Israel declared that it was expropriating 4,000 dunams of land west of Bethlehem to expand the settlement bloc of Gush Etzion. This would strangle a cluster of Palestinian villages lying to the west of Bethlehem, and would break the geographical continuity between the Bethlehem area and Hebron, thus in effect forming a huge settlement bloc. The document also contained a warning against violating the sanctity of the Noble Sanctuary.

  45. Suleiman al-Khalidi, “Jordan Recalls Envoy to Israel over Jerusalem ‘Violations,’” Reuters, 5

    November 2014, accessed 21 July 2015, online at www.reuters.com/article/2014/11/05/us-mideast- jordan-israel-idUSKBN0IP1HZ20141105.

  46. For a comparison of the two halves of Jerusalem, see B’Tselem, Neglect of Infrastructure and Services in Palestinian Neighborhoods (Jerusalem: B’Tselem, 1 January 2011), accessed 21 July 2015, online at www.btselem.org/ jerusalem/infrastructure_and_services.

  47. For the murder of Mohammed Abu Khdeir and the immediate reactions that took Jerusalem’s neighborhoods by storm see “Harb shawari‘ haqiqiyya fi ahiya’ al-Quds: ta‘n shurti isra’ili wa hariq dakhm fi mathaf Rockefeller” [Real War on the Streets in Jerusalem’s Neighborhoods: Israeli Policeman Stabbed and Large Fire at the Rockefeller Museum], Dunya al- Watan, 4 July 2014, accessed 21 July 2015, online at www.alwatanvoice.com/arabic/ news/2014/07/04/561946.html.

  48. On the subject of the arrest of children in Jerusalem, see Huda Barud, “Muhami ‘al- Damir’: al-ihtilal yata‘ammad i‘tiqal al-atfal dun tuham haqiqiyya” [Lawyer for Addameer: The Occupation Purposefully Arrests Children without Real Charges], Filastin Online, 4 February 2014, accessed 21 July 2015, online at felesteen.ps/details/news/109523/.

  49. See, for example, “al-Ihtilal yashunn hamlat i‘tiqalat fi al-Quds al-muhtalla baynahum atfal” [The Occupation Launches a Campaign of Arrests in Occupied Jerusalem, among them Children], Quds Net, 25 May 2015, accessed 21 July 2015, online at www.qudsn.ps/article/68052.

  50. See Ir Amim, Toward a Point of No Return: Lifting the Political Restraints in East Jerusalem (Jerusalem: Ir Amim, 1 February 2011), accessed 21 July 2015, online at www.ir-amim.org.il/en/ report/toward-point-no-return-lifting-political- restraints-east-jerusalem.