1500,<> Palestinians in the face of massive waves of displacement
Israel Refuses to Freeze Demolition Orders for 116 Jerusalemites in Al-Bustan
Residents pray in front of their homes threatened with demolition. Emirates Today
Al-Bustan is one of six Jerusalem neighborhoods inside Silwan facing demolition and eviction. Emirates Today
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300 meters from the southern wall of the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque, Al-Bustan neighborhood is in the middle of the town of Silwan, on an area of 70 dunums, all of which have become permissible for the occupation to seize them and demolish the homes of their residents completely, after the Israeli occupation courts and municipality in the Holy City refused to freeze demolition orders for 116 homes in the neighborhood.
As a result, fear has crept into the homes of the Jerusalem neighborhood, and it has become closer to its more than 1500,<> Jerusalemites, as the demolitions of their homes have become without any legal cover, and may be carried out at any moment, according to the recent Israeli decision against the "orchard".
Al-Bustan is one of six Jerusalem neighborhoods inside Silwan, facing the threat of demolition and expulsion, with the aim of tightening the Israeli grip against the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque, which is adjacent to the Jerusalem neighborhood from the southern and southeastern sides.
Full control
Since the first month of this year, the Israeli Minister of National Security, Itamar Ben Gvir, issued a decision to demolish unlicensed homes in Jerusalem, including those in the Al-Bustan neighborhood, whose residents the Israeli municipality in Al-Sharif refuses to grant building permits categorically, according to Murad Abu Shafi', head of the Al-Bustan Defense Committee.
Abu Shafea told Emirates Today, in an exclusive interview: "To complement the sides of this decision, the occupation municipality in the holy city refused to extend or freeze the decisions to demolish our homes, and after many of its Judaization projects that it put forward in the past, it also submitted a final plan, which includes demolishing our entire homes, converting part of the eastern, central and western areas of the orchard into public parks open to settlers, and building houses over a small area within the Jerusalem neighborhood."
Abu Shafea describes the recent Israeli decision for the residents of Al-Bustan as "the hair that broke the camel's back," and says: "Our homes are currently vulnerable to the incursion of the occupation soldiers and their demolition by its military vehicles overnight."
He pointed out that the homes of the Al-Bustan neighborhood are currently under the Israeli Kamenetz Law, which strips Jerusalemite residents of the ability to defend themselves before Israeli courts, which have never done them justice in land and home cases, while supporting the positions of settler associations, foremost of which are Elad and Ateret Cohanim.
A human tragedy
"The Al-Bustan neighborhood embraces 120 houses, housing hundreds of Jerusalemites who have owned them for decades, and almost all of them will become a relic after an eye, coinciding with the first Israeli bulldozer to enter the Jerusalem neighborhood," this scene is not wished for by the families of the Jerusalem neighborhood, just like Qutayba Odeh, a resident of Al-Bustan, who and his family face the threat of demolishing their three homes, which house dozens of people, more than half of them children.
Odeh shows that children constitute 63% of the total population of the Jerusalem neighborhood, which puts their lives at great risk and causes them a real human tragedy.
The Jerusalemite citizen said: "As a result of the occupation demolishing our homes, which we fear will happen day and night, a new catastrophe of displacement will occur, affecting the great and the small alike, who have no other place to shelter them except the few meters in which they are currently located."
Extended ambitions
Since 2005, the Israeli municipality has been striving to demolish the entire Al-Bustan neighborhood, under the pretext of building without a permit. On the other hand, the residents of the Jerusalem neighborhood did their best to preserve their properties and homes, and to reject the policy of uprooting them from their land.
Abu Shafea continues: "The residents of the neighborhood have for two decades submitted structural engineering plans to organize and license their homes, but the occupation municipality in the holy city categorically rejects these plans every time, and even issues decisions to demolish our homes under the pretext of building without a permit!"
He adds that "the occupation argues that the Al-Bustan neighborhood was a biblical garden, inside which King David used to walk 3000,<> years ago, and also claims that the demolition of the Al-Bustan neighborhood is in the interest of establishing (the King's Garden), but the correct version, the seizure of (Al-Bustan) is in the interest of settlement expansion plans, given its religious and historical status, being closer to the Temple Mount."