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Israeli forces demolish Palestinian house Sheikh Jarrah | Occupied East Jerusalem News

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Sheikh Jarrah, Occupied East Jerusalem – Israeli forces have destroyed the home of a Palestinian family in the occupied Sheikh Jarrah district of East Jerusalem, with the family trying to prevent the demolition and threatening to blow up the house within days.

Israeli police and special forces searched Salhiyeh’s house and cordoned off the area at 3:00 a.m. (1 GMT) on Wednesday. The family told Al Jazeera that dozens of armed forces had entered their home while they were sleeping and attacked family members, arresting six of them, including the head of the house, Mahmoud Salhiyeh.

Another 18 Palestinians who expressed solidarity with their families were also arrested.

The demolition began with a call to prayer at dawn at approximately 5:00 a.m. (3 GMT), on one of the coldest nights of this year’s winter season with rainstorms. The 18-year-old family has been left homeless.

Israeli authorities have justified the demolition to build a special education school for the residents of the neighborhood.

Family member Yasmeen Salhiyeh, 19, said Israeli forces cut off the house’s electricity and threw tear gas inside and around the house. About 50 agents told Al Jazeera that “they searched the house and started beating the men in the family; they also attacked my aunt.”

“My father was taken out of bed, beaten along with my brothers and cousins,” he said, before being arrested, “without giving him a chance to put on clothes,” he said.

The demolition took place on Wednesday morning in a downpour [Zena Tahhan/Al Jazeera]

Yasmeen added that Israeli forces fired rubber bullets at activists and journalists trying to reach the scene of the demolition, injuring several others. Doctors prevented him from treating the injured, he continued.

Jawad Siam, head of the Wadi Helweh Information Center monitoring team, arrived at the scene around 03:30 (1:30 GMT). He told Al Jazeera that “about 200 police, border police, Yammam and special forces” were on the scene.

A few hours after the demolition ended and Israeli forces were largely out, Yasmeen said they had no information about the whereabouts of the detainees and their families.

The Salhiyeh House is located on the main street of Sheikh Jarrah’s flashpoint district, a mile (half a mile) north of the walls of Jerusalem’s Old City. Many families in the neighborhood are facing immediate deportation by Israeli authorities.

A map showing the remains of the Salhiya family's home in Sheikh Jarrah, occupied by East Jerusalem after the demolition of Israeli forces on January 19.(Al Jazeera)

Israeli forces initially tried to demolish the house on Monday, but the family put up a barricade on its roof and threatened to blow up the house instead of facing relocation, and there was full-day tension with authorities.

“I will burn down the house and everything in it,” said Mahmoud Salhiyeh, who was surrounded by a gas canister on the roof of his house. “I will not leave here, only from here to the grave, for there is no life, no dignity.

“I’ve been fighting with them for 25 years, they sent me settlers who offered to buy me a house, and I didn’t agree.”

Israeli authorities have ordered the confiscation of the land on the pretext that the assets of the six dunes will be used to build a special school, according to the family.

Israeli police said in a statement via Twitter on Wednesday that “this land was expropriated by local authorities with the intention of establishing a special education school for the residents of the neighborhood.”

The final trial of the Israeli court for the transfer of the family was set for January 23. Forced relocation in the Occupied Territories violates international law.

“There was hope that the family would have more time,” Siam said. “Lawyers have asked for an extension of the demolition period; they hoped to stop it temporarily.”

The remains of a house demolished by Israeli forces in the Sheikh Jarrah district.Things of the Salhiyeh family lay on the ground after the demolition [Zena Tahhan/Al Jazeera]

The family was forcibly relocated from their home in the central West Jerusalem town of Ein Karem in the 1948 Nakba or catastrophe when Zionist militias forcibly deported about 750,000 Palestinians to form the state of Israel.

Local activist Mohammad Abu al-Hommos said Wednesday’s demolition was “revenge”.

“The Israelis wanted to prove that they could reach out to the family, even if the family managed to block the demolition for 48 hours,” he told Al Jazeera on the spot.

“They wanted to demolish the spirit of the Mahmud family, to destroy their history and their memories. Mahmoud’s parents were once relocated from Ein Karem, and they are here in 2022, they are relocating again, ”Abu al-Hommos added.

“This is about Judaism in Jerusalem,” he continued.

Local NGOs and rights groups have long stated a range of Israeli practices and policies aimed at changing the demographic side of Jews in Jerusalem, the goal set in the city’s 2000 master plan as “maintaining a strong Jewish majority in the city.”

The proliferation of illegal settlements, the demolition of Palestinian homes and restrictions on urban development are some of the main avenues being used to achieve this goal, according to rights groups.

Israel occupied the eastern half of the city militarily in 1967. About 57% of all occupied land in East Jerusalem has been expropriated by Israeli authorities, including private Palestinian owners, both to build illegal settlements and to zoning the land as “green spaces”. and public infrastructure ”. The remaining 30 percent is made up of “unplanned areas” where construction is also prohibited.

The Israeli authorities are in danger of relocating 280 Palestinian homes with 970 people in Jerusalem, including 424 children, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UN OCHA).

Grassroots al-Quds, a Jerusalem-based Palestinian NGO, said Israel’s actions were “part of a large-scale plan to evacuate Palestinian residents from al-Sheikh Jarrah,” including plans to build new illegal Jewish settlements.

Popular protests in Palestine erupted in May when Israeli authorities tried to forcibly relocate the al-Kurd Palestinian family from Sheikh Jarrah’s house to settle settlers. Many other families in the neighborhood are also facing immediate forced displacement.



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