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Occupiers issue a further 17 demolition orders in Jerusalem

The Israeli municipality in occupied Jerusalem issued orders to demolish 17 buildings and homes, some of them were built 10 years ago in the Al-Thawri neighborhood in eastern Jerusalem.

Qadar Harini, one of those who received demolition notices, said that he expects the arrival of municipal staff any moment to demolish his two-story home, pointing out that he built his house 10 years ago without being able to get a building permit because of red tape, unaffordable high taxes and the rejection of his requests to build a home at the pretext that his land is small.

Harini added that Israeli municipal staff roam the neighborhood's streets everyday taking pictures of homes and issuing exorbitant fines against any alleged unlicensed construction even if it was a decorative panel above some door.


Harini emphasized that in case his home was demolished, he would challenge this arbitrary measure through pitching a tent in place of his demolished home.

For his part, Ziad Al-Hammouri, the director of Jerusalem center for social and economic rights, said the Israeli municipality in Jerusalem intensified nowadays its measures against Palestinian homes in eastern Jerusalem especially in the areas of Attor, Issawiya and Silwan as well as the two apartment buildings in the Abbasiya neighborhood.

Hammouri warned of Israeli fierce attack against Jerusalemites behind the separation wall through using the so-called 'law of the custodian of absentee property' in order to seize more Palestinian land.

He also noted that after completing the construction of the apartheid wall around the Jerusalem and expanding the surrounding external settlements, the new Israeli government would likely focus on reducing the number of Palestinian citizens in Jerusalem to 70,000 out of the current census population of 285,000.

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