In a rare victory for Palestinian residents, a judge has stopped an infrastructure project linked to a settler organisation in occupied east Jerusalem, civic rights groups said on Thursday.
The Jerusalem District Court found that the $8-million municipal project supported by the Eldad settler group in the Silwan neighbourhood was illegal because it lacked construction permits, the Association for Civil Rights in Israel (Acri) and rights group Bimkom said.
Acri said the planned construction of sidewalks and facade renovations was designed to make the neighbourhood suitable for tourists who visit the City of David archaeological site, ”at the expense of open spaces, green areas, and parking spots for actual residents of the neighbourhood”.
Eldad, a group dedicated to expanding Jewish ownership in Arab areas of east Jerusalem, says the site is where the palace of the biblical King David once stood, a claim disputed by many archaeologists.
Rights groups say that over the years, government bodies have transferred both private Palestinian property and national parks in the Silwan neighbourhood to Elad, which they say effectively operates the City of David site.
Authorities plan to raze 88 Palestinian homes in Silwan they say were built illegally, a controversial decision which critics claim is part of a plan to ”Judaise” east Jerusalem.
The city’s Palestinian residents accuse the Israeli-run municipality of discriminating against them and making it virtually impossible to get legal permits for new homes or extensions to existing ones.
Israel captured east Jerusalem from Jordan in 1967 and annexed it in a move not recognised by the international community. It considers all of Jerusalem its ”eternal and indivisible” capital, but foreign embassies are all located in Tel Aviv.
The Palestinians want east Jerusalem to be the capital of their promised state. — Sapa-AFP