- For Jews, Jerusalem is its historic capital. Muslims
also claim it for the third holiest site in Islam, containing the 35 acre
Noble Sanctuary (al-Haram al-Sharif), including the Al-Aqsa Mosque and
Dome of the Rock.
-
- The 1947 UN Partition Plan designated Jerusalem an international
city under a UN Trusteeship Council. After Israel's 1947-48 War of Independence,
it was divided between Israel and Jordan, and during Israel's 1967 Six-Day
War, East Jerusalem was captured and occupied, its current status today.
-
- In March 2009, a confidential EU report (now public)
accused Israel of using settlement expansions, house demolitions, discriminatory
housing policies, restrictive permits, closing Palestinian institutions,
the West Bank Separation Wall, and various other ways to "actively
pursu(e) the illegal annexation" of East Jerusalem and "increase
Jewish presence" in the city.
-
- In a December 2009 report, the Adalah Legal Center for
Arab Minority Rights in Israel affirmed the EU report's concerns. Titled
"Dispossession and Eviction in Jerusalem," it provides historical
context, a legal overview, and case study examples in Sheikh Jarrah, an
East Jerusalem neighborhood between the Old City and Mount Scopus.
-
- The community "has become the site of a protracted
legal battle whose implications range from the evictions of more than 25
families to the visibility of a future Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement
and the" ultimate status of Jerusalem.
-
- Four families have already been evicted from homes they've
lived in for over 50 years. The others are awaiting court appearances and
rulings to decide their fate, nearly certain given Israel's history of
judicial unfairness toward Arabs, including its own citizens having no
rights in a nation affording them solely to Jews.
-
- Since the 1970s, Israeli settlers have targeted Sheikh
Jarrah, seeking control of property they claim Jews owned before 1948 as
a way to increase Jewish residency in "strategically located"
parts of East Jerusalem. Specific areas include the Shepherd Hotel compound,
the Karm Al-Mufti olive grove, and Karm Al-Ja'ouni, but Sheikh Jarrah in
its entirety demonstrates the futility of decades of legal battles and
"an inherent legislative bias that renders adherence to international
legal standards ineffectual."
-
- Background
-
- In 1956, three UNWRA-Jordanian agreements promised 28
families Sheikh Jarrah property deeds they never got. One let them lease
the land as refugees. The second agreed to fund their homes, and the third
stipulated that "in exchange for nominal rent payments (and other
provisions), the families would lease (them) for three years," after
which they'd have legal title. Despite adhering to contract terms, they
never got it.
-
- After the 1956 Six-Day War, the Israeli General Custodian
controlled Sheikh Jarrah. Then in 1972, the Sephardic Community Committee
and the Knesset Israel Committee (both religious and ideological) sought
ownership rights, based on a historical and religious affiliation during
the Ottoman era, using "koshan," a legal title as the basis of
their claim, dating from the early 19th century, then finalized in 1886.
-
- The "koshan's" validity is central to the current
claim and legal challenges to decide who has rightful ownership. But according
to expert testimonies, the document's authenticity is in doubt as they
don't conform to Ottoman era criteria, so therein lies the rub.
-
- Further, according to the Israeli Land Registry Office,
the "koshan" doesn't bear on the rights of parties already inhabiting
the land and isn't proof of ownership. Nonetheless, 23 Palestinian families
were ordered to pay rent. Legal challenges followed, so it's for the courts
to decide who owns the land rightfully.
-
- Earlier in 1982, a protracted legal battle began after
the Committees jointly sued 23 of the families. At the time, it was resolved
by granting the validity of the Committees' claim while giving the families
"protected tenant" status, removing the threat of eviction provided
they paid rent regularly and refrained from renovating or changing the
property. The case became a modern precedent for settling Karm Al-Ja'ouni
neighborhood disputes, but it failed to address the legitimacy of the Committees'
claim or the consent of the other 17 families.
-
- The agreement became the legal basis for subsequent court-ordered
evictions and "rendered....inquiries into the legitimacy of the Committees
ownership claims redundant from a domestic legal perspective."
-
- Here's the problem. The four evicted families deny ever
consenting, their lawyer acting on his own for settlement, yet what he
achieved "diverged greatly" from his clients' wishes. The families
remain steadfast, saying they were misrepresented, kept uninformed, and
maintain the homes are theirs, based on the UNRWA-Jordanian agreement.
-
- In addition, the 1982 court decision stipulated that
the settlement may be challenged if clear proof shows it was reached on
false grounds. Perhaps so as the affected families got no additional benefits
beyond their undisputed rights.
-
- "Protected tenancy" derives from the 1972 Tenant
Protection Law, protecting against East Jerusalem evictions under Israeli
law. Nonetheless, the settlement became the legal standard for subsequent
confrontations over ownership claims.
-
- Numerous legal actions followed without resolution, despite
the "koshan's" uncertain authenticity based on a 19th century
Ottoman document. However, the Committees have prevailed so far, not the
families, four already evicted, the others very much in jeopardy. From
an overall perspective, the:
-
- "measures employed to (remove them) relate to one
of a number of complementary initiatives undertaken by both public and
private actors intent on creating, and maintaining, a Jewish demographic
majority throughout occupied East Jerusalem" toward the ultimate goal
of making all Jerusalem exclusively Jewish.
-
- Currently, four Sheikh Jarrah planning schemes are in
different approval stages, the largest being TPS 12705, submitted by Nahalat
Shimon International in August 2008, applying directly to the land where
the families live. If approved, construction of 200 new Jewish only residential
units will proceed, affecting 500 Palestinians who'll be evicted and their
homes demolished.
-
- Other developments involve smaller projects, all favoring
Jews over Palestinians. Together, they'll "advance the creation of
Israeli strongholds in the holy basin surrounding the Old City with Sheikh
Jarrah to the north, Silwan to the south, and the Mount of Olives to the
east." The idea is to build a number of Jewish neighborhoods linking
West Jerusalem and Mount Scopus, a Jewish continuity, simultaneously displacing
longstanding Palestinian residents from their own land.
-
- As for the 28 Palestinian families, they're an impediment
to Israel's aim. The solution then is remove them with the help of obliging
courts that usually deliver.
-
- The issue "also represents the most evolved (initiative)
facilitating the development of Jewish settlements throughout this sector
of occupied East Jerusalem." It began over 30 years ago, initiating
a long succession of rental demands and subsequent legal actions.
-
- Family Testimonies
-
- The Al-Kurd Family's testimony is instructive. Shortly
after the 1948 war, Fawzyeh Al-Kurd was born in the Old City. Needing a
new home, she found it in Sheikh Jarrah, thanks to the UNWRA-Jordan agreement.
She's been there ever since, married Mohammed Kamel Al-Kurd in 1970, and
raised six children. Two years later, litigation demanding rent began when
she was young and didn't realize the consequences.
-
- Over the years, hardships and continuous legal proceedings
generated "fear and uncertainty" that culminated on November
8, 2008 when heavily armed, masked police entered their home forcibly in
the middle of the night after locking down the neighborhood.
-
- Though ill and confined to a wheelchair, Mohammed was
thrown to the sidewalk, suffered a heart attack, and died a week later
from a second one. He was too sick to contest. In mourning, Fawzyeh lived
in a tent, protested, and was harassed by police. Confused and frustrated,
she noted that "Many people, organizations, and governments know of
my case, yet the world has remained silent."
-
- In two separate 1999 lawsuits, the Committees demanded
that the family be evicted over rent delinquency and Tenant Protection
Law violations. They prevailed, and an eviction order was issued, based
on a 1989 Civil Appeal ruling and the Committees' 1972 "koshan."
The Al-Kurds were held in contempt for violating the Committees' rights,
the judgment also saying if the family objected, they had to pay rent to
a court fund until the ownership question was resolved.
-
- The Al-Kurds' appeal was rejected on the grounds that
the family failed to prove they were misrepresented and that delay in filing
the claim effectively undermined their position.
-
- In 2008, the family sued in the High Court of Justice
(HCJ) in which they requested a declaratory judgment under which their
lawyer's agreement and subsequent verdicts would be voided. Again they
were rejected, the HCJ ruling that the family failed to meet the requisite
burden of proof.
-
- The Al-Ghawi family's experience was just as frustrating
- losing their home, living in a tent for six months until returning while
legal proceedings continued until receiving a final notice in August 2009
when police stormed the house, removed them forcibly, and destroyed most
of their belongings in the process. Reflecting on the episode, Fuad Al-Ghawi
said "The reaction of the children has been terrible. They are afraid
and unable to forget that they once lived" there.
-
- Yet he remained steadfast seeking an alternative solution,
saying:
-
- "We are waiting for someone to help us. I am struggling
to stay in Jerusalem. Our options are limited; the cost of a new house
here is very high. I don't know what we are going to do, but we won't leave,
or else we will never be allowed back."
-
- For the Hanoun family, suffering compounded by uncertainty
became an element of every day life, Maher saying it was "impossible
to plan for a future." Evicted in 2002, they were again in August
2009. The experience took its toll.
-
- "The eviction has destroyed our lives. To live on
the street is so hard. It kills my family to watch strange faces living
in the home in which we spent our lives."
-
- Yet Maher is determined to achieve an equitable solution
for his family and other Sheikh Jarrah residents. His home motivates his
spirit. "The same house contains the history, memories, and dreams
of my family."
-
- The Sabbagh family lived in their home since 1956 when
named in the initial 1972 actions against Sheikh Jarrah residents. Finally
in June 2009, a court document challenged their land ownership right, the
same action Mohammed Sabbagh knew his neighbors faced over the years. Preparing
for the worst, his case remains ongoing awaiting the next court hearing.
It's already convened twice, both times Committee lawyers requesting a
delay for being unable to supply requested documents.
-
- The other families keep struggling, facing one obstacle
after another, being rejected time and again, yet persisting to retain
land they rightfully own.
-
- International Law Considerations
-
- Numerous international laws affirm the right to housing,
property, protection against forced evictions, and reparations. Yet Israel
repeatedly violates them. Consider Jerusalem. The UN Partition Plan designated
it an international city under a UN Trusteeship Council. But contrary to
international laws, Israel claims sovereignty, imposed control, and is
incrementally removing Palestinians to make it exclusively a Jewish city.
-
- On June 7, 1967, Defense Minister Moshe Dayan proclaimed:
The Israeli Defense Forces have liberated Jerusalem. We have reunited the
torn city, the capital of Israel. We have returned to this most sacred
shrine, never to part from it again."
-
- Yet General Assembly and Security Council resolutions
called for the city's immediate, unconditional "demilitarization"
and "internationalization."
-
- Nonetheless, in 1967, historic Palestine became belligerently
occupied. Jerusalem was declared its capital, and Palestinians have been
systematically removed, despite UN resolutions declaring all:
-
- "measures taken by Israel to change the status of
the city to be invalid, (and ordering its government to) rescind all such
measures already taken and to desist forthwith from taking any further
actions which tend to change the status of Jerusalem."
-
- July 1980 was defining when Israel passed its Basic Law:
Jerusalem, Capital of Israel (the Jerusalem Law), declaring the city "complete
and united (as) the capital of Israel."
-
- East Jerusalem was effectively annexed in violation of
international law and Israel's noncompliance with Security Council and
General Assembly resolutions. SC Resolution 478 (August 20, 1980) declared
the law null and void, a violation of international law, and required it
be rescinded forthwith. The vote was 14 - 0, America abstaining.
-
- Israel categorically rejected it, announcing "It
will not undermine the status of Jerusalem as the capital of a sovereign
Israel and as a united city which will never again be torn apart."
-
- International laws state otherwise, requiring an occupying
power to respect territorial laws in place, any new ones conforming with
the provisions of Fourth Geneva's Article 64 and Article 43 of the Hague
Regulations.
-
- Geneva stipulates:
-
- "The penal laws of the occupied territory shall
remain in force, with the exception that they may be repealed or suspended
by the Occupying Power in cases where they constitute a threat to its security
or an obstacle to the application of the present Convention....the tribunals
of the occupied territory shall continue to function in respect of all
offences covered by the said laws."
-
- In defiance, Israel imposed its will, thereafter tightening
it ruthlessly. As a result, Sheikh Jarrah residents are governed under
Israeli law, affording them no justice or redress.
-
- Combined, Hague (1907) and Geneva (1949 and subsequent
additions) international law provisions comprise the core body of occupation
law. They regard military occupation as temporary, for the period only
between cessation of hostilities and a peace treaty. Occupying powers have
no sovereignty over territories they control. They're temporary trustees,
responsible under Hague's Article 43:
-
- to "take all measures in (their) power to restore,
and ensure, as far as possible, public order and safety, while respecting,
unless absolutely prevented, the laws in force in the country."
-
- Even then, Hague and Geneva stipulate that any legislative
or other changes must benefit the civilian population, protect their rights,
and prescribe no unlawful measures, including collective punishment, forcible
transfer, or the confiscation or destruction of their property.
-
- Especially relevant is Israel's 1970 Legal and Administrative
Matters of Law. It was enacted to include all properties Jews claimed ownership
of pre-1948, empowering an Administrator General to return them to their
previous owners. A separate law prohibited Palestinians from reclaiming
lost West Jerusalem land - actions Hague and Geneva provisions call discriminatory,
illegal, and unjustifiable.
-
- Under Fourth Geneva's Article 4, East Jerusalem Palestinians
are "protected persons," Article 29 stating:
-
- "the party to the conflict in whose hands protected
persons may be, is responsible for the treatment accorded to them by its
agents, irrespective of any individual responsibility which may be incurred."
-
- Article 27 states:
-
- "Protected persons are entitled, in all circumstances,
to respect for their persons, their honour, their family rights, their
religious convictions and practices, and their manners and customs. They
shall at all times be humanely treated, and shall be protected especially
against all acts of violence or threats thereof and....all protected persons
shall be treated with the same consideration by the Party to the conflict
in whose power they are, without any adverse distinction based, in particular,
on race, religion or political opinion."
-
- In other words, occupied people are ensured absolute
protection. Under international law, violations hold no validity, including
illegal territorial annexations.
-
- Confiscating and demolishing Palestinian homes for Jewish
settlements constitute serious legal breaches. Hague's Article 46 prohibits
expropriation, and Article 47 bans pillage.
-
- Fourth Geneva's Article 53 forbids private property
destruction, not justified by military necessity that ends when hostilities
cease.
-
- Belligerently occupying Sheikh Jarrah "invalidates
any recourse to military necessity as the basis of the seizure and proposed
destruction of private property." Doing it for 200 exclusively Jewish
residential units is a grave international law breach, that under the Rome
Statute's Article 8(2)(a)(iv) is a war crime.
-
- It also violates Fourth Geneva's Article 49 stipulating
that the "Occupying Power shall not deport or transfer parts of its
own civilian population into the territory it occupies" nor forcibly
remove its lawful residents. The Rome Statute calls this a war crime.
-
- Thus far, four Sheikh Jarrah families (with its 100 residents)
have been forcibly uprooted and evicted. The fate of 24 others (with hundreds
more) hangs in the balance, besides thousands already displaced and the
entire East Jerusalem Palestinian population targeted for removal - involuntarily,
forcibly and illegally. The International Criminal Court calls forced displacement
a war crime and a crime against humanity when part of a widespread and
systematic attack on a civilian population.
-
- Numerous other international laws respect the right to
property and protection against confiscation, destruction, and forced evictions,
including the:
-
- -- Universal Declaration of Human Rights;
-
- -- International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights;
-
- -- International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural
Rights;
-
- -- Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Racial
Discrimination;
-
- -- Convention on the elimination of All Forms of Discrimination
Against Women; and
-
- -- Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees.
-
- Sheikh Jarrah is a "poignant case study" highlighting
Israel's belligerent lawlessness. It's "a microcosm of Israel's aggressive
East Jerusalem" land policies over the entire West Bank, providing
"a documented example of the (multiple public and private forces)
engaged in cementing (its) claim to sovereignty over (all) Jerusalem"
and as much of the West Bank as it wishes.
-
- Palestinians have endured decades of occupied belligerency
and the systematic theft of their land, the international community failing
to fulfill its obligations under Article 1 to the four Geneva Conventions
stipulating:
-
- "The High Contracting Parties undertake to respect
and to ensure respect for the present Convention in all circumstances,"
meaning they must intervene to enforce the law by holding violator states
liable.
-
- Yet for over six decades, Israel's has remained unaccountable,
including for state terrorism, belligerency, militarized occupation, arrests,
incarcerations, random killings, targeted assassinations, torture, free
movement and expression restrictions, crop destruction, economic strangulation,
home demolitions, land seizures, and forced displacement, yet the world
community is silent.
-
- How long will this continue? When will justice be served?
Why haven't supportive millions acted to assure it? People of conscience
demand answers. It's high time they got them.
-
- Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the Centre
for Research on Globalization. He lives in Chicago and can be reached at
lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.
-
- Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and
listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive
Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network Thursdays at 10AM US Central
time and Saturdays and Sundays at noon. All programs are archived for easy
listening.
-
- http://prognewshour.progressiveradionetwork.org/
-
- http://lendmennews.progressiveradionetwork.org/
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