A view of the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood in East Jerusalem / credit David Shankbone
There are two separate Sheikh Jarrah stories —one read and watched in the news and another that receives little media coverage or due analysis.
The obvious story is that of the nightly raids and violence meted out by Israeli police and Jewish extremists against Palestinians in the devastated East Jerusalem neighborhood.
For weeks, thousands of Jewish extremists have targeted Palestinian communities in Jerusalem’s Old City. Their objective is the removal of Palestinian families from their homes in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood. They are not acting alone. Their riots and rampages are directed by a well-coordinated leadership composed of extremist Zionist and Jewish groups, such as the Otzma Yehudit party and the Lehava Movement. Their unfounded claims, violent actions and abhorrent chant “Death to the Arabs” are validated by Israeli politicians, such as Knesset member Itamar Ben-Gvir and the Deputy Mayor of Jerusalem, Arieh King.
Here is a little introduction to the political discourse of Ben-Gvir and King, who were caught on video shouting and insulting a wounded Palestinian protester. The video starts with MK Ben-Gvir disparagingly yelling at a Palestinian who was apparently wounded by Israeli police, yet returned to protest against the evictions planned for Sheikh Jarrah.
Ben-Gvir is heard shouting, “Abu Hummus, how is your ass?”
“The bullet is still there, that’s why he is limping,” responds the Deputy Mayor, King, to Ben-Gvir. King continues, “Did they take the bullet out of your ass? Did they take it out already? It is a pity it did not go in here,” King continues, pointing to his head.
Delighted with what they perceive to be a whimsical commentary on the wounding of the Palestinian, Ben-Gvir and King’s entourage of Jewish extremists laugh.
While “Abu Hummus”, wounded yet still protesting, is a testament to the tenacity of the Palestinian people, King, Ben-Gvir, the settlers and the police are a representation of the united Israeli front aimed at ethnically cleansing Palestinians and ensuring Jewish majority in Jerusalem.
Another important participant in the ongoing Israeli ethnic cleansing campaign in Jerusalem is Israel’s court system which has provided a legal cover for the targeting of Palestinian inhabitants of Jerusalem.
The legal foundation of the Jewish settlers’ constant attempts at acquiring more Palestinian properties can be traced back to a specific 1970 law, known as the Legal and Administrative Matters Law, which allowed Jews to sue Palestinians for properties they claim to have owned prior to the establishment of Israel on the ruins of historic Palestine in 1948. While Palestinians are excluded from making similar claims, Israeli courts have generously handed Palestinian homes, lands and other assets to Jewish claimants. In turn, these homes, as in the case of Sheikh Jarrah and other Palestinian neighborhoods in East Jerusalem, are often sold to Jewish settler organizations to build yet more colonies on occupied Palestinian land.
Last February, the Israeli Supreme Court awarded Jewish settlers the right to many Palestinian homes in Sheikh Jarrah. Following a Palestinian and international backlash, it offered Palestinians a ‘compromise’, whereby Palestinian families relinquished ownership rights to their homes and agreed to continue to live there as tenants, paying rents to the very illegal Jewish settlers who have stolen their homes in the first place, but who are now armed with a court decision.
However, the ‘logic’ through which Jews claim Palestinian properties as their own should not be associated with a few extremist organizations. After all, the ethnic cleansing of Palestine in 1948 was not the work of a few extreme Zionists. Similarly, the illegal occupation of East Jerusalem, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip in 1967 and the massive settlement enterprise that followed was not the brainchild of a few extreme individuals. Colonialism in Israel was, and remains, a state-run project, which ultimately aims at achieving the same objective that is being carried out in Sheikh Jarrah—the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians to ensure Jewish demographic majority.
This is the untold story of Sheikh Jarrah, one that cannot be expressed by a few news bytes or social media posts. However, this most relevant narrative is largely hidden. It is easier to blame a few Jewish extremists than to hold the entire Israeli government accountable. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is constantly manipulating the subject of demographics to advance the interests of his Jewish constituency. He is a strong believer in an exclusive Jewish state and also fully aware of the political influence of Jewish settlers. For example, shortly before the March 23 elections, Netanyahu made a decision to greenlight the construction of 540 illegal settlement units in the so-called Har-Homa E Area (Abu Ghneim Mountain) in the occupied West Bank, in the hope of acquiring as many votes as possible.
While the Sheikh Jarrah story is garnering some attention even in mainstream U.S. media, there is a near-complete absence of any depth to that coverage, namely the fact that Sheikh Jarrah is not the exception but the norm. Sadly, as Palestinians and their supporters try to circumvent widespread media censorship by reaching out directly to civil societies across the world using social media platforms, they are often censored there, as well.
One of the videos initially censored by Instagram is that of Muna al-Kurd, a Palestinian woman who had lost her home in Sheikh Jarrah to a Jewish settler by the name of Yakub.
“Yakub, you know this is not your house,” Muna is seen outside her home, speaking to Yakub.
Yakub answers, “Yes, but if I go, you don’t go back. So what’s the problem? Why are you yelling at me? I didn’t do this. I didn’t do this. It’s easy to yell at me, but I didn’t do this.
Muna: “You are stealing my house.”
Yakub: “And if I don’t steal it, someone else is going to steal it.”
Muna: “No. No one is allowed to steal it.”
The untold story of Sheikh Jarrah, of Jerusalem – in fact, of all of Palestine—is that of Muna and Yakub, the former representing Palestine, the latter, Israel. For justice to ever be attained, Muna must be allowed to reclaim her stolen home and Yakub must be held accountable for his crime.
Ramzy Baroud is a journalist and editor of The Palestine Chronicle. He is the author of five books. His latest is These Chains Will Be Broken: Palestinian Stories of Struggle and
Defiance in Israeli Prisons (Clarity Press). Dr. Baroud is Non-resident Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Islam and Global Affairs (CIGA) and also at the Afro-Middle East Center (AMEC). His website is ramzybaroud.net.
Ukrainian President Volodomyr Zelensky (left) with former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Background: Israeli flag / credit: Toward Freedom photo illustration
Editor’s Note: This article was first published in The Grayzone.
Just forty days after Russia’s military campaign began inside Ukraine, Ukrainian President Vlodymyr Zelensky told reporters that in the future, his country would be like “a big Israel.” The following day, one of Israel’s top promoters in the Democratic Party published an op-ed in NATO’s official think tank exploring how that could be executed.
Zelensky made his prediction while speaking to reporters on April 5, rejecting the idea that Kiev would remain neutral in future conflicts between NATO, the European Union, and Russia. According to Zelensky, his country would never be like Switzerland (which coincidentally abandoned its Napoleon-era tradition of nonalignment by sanctioning Russia in response to its February invasion).
“We cannot talk about ‘Switzerland of the future,’” the president informed reporters. “But we will definitely become a ‘big Israel’ with its own face.”
For those wondering what a “big Israel” would actually look like, Zelensky quickly elaborated on his disturbing prophecy.
“We will not be surprised that we will have representatives of the Armed Forces or the National Guard in all institutions, supermarkets, cinemas—there will be people with weapons,” Ukraine’s president said, predicting a bleak existence for his citizens. “I am sure that our security issue will be number one in the next ten years.”
Though the web post was based on comments Zelensky made to reporters, the president’s office mysteriously excised a section of his remarks in which he declared a future Ukraine would not be “absolutely liberal, European.” Instead, along with his vision for a heavily militarized Ukraine, the post emphasized Zelensky’s readiness to join NATO “already tomorrow.”
For NATO’s power brokers, however, Zelensky’s intimated willingness to join the military alliance was perhaps the least remarkable aspect of his statement. Instead, within 48 hours of his comments, the Atlantic Council—NATO’s semi-official think tank in Washington—published a “road map” exploring how to transform Ukraine into “a big Israel.”
Authored by Daniel B. Shapiro, the former U.S. Ambassador to Israel under President Barack Obama, the document posited that “the two embattled countries share more than you might think.”
Just as former U.S. Secretary of State Alexander Haig presented Israel as “the largest American air craft carrier in the world that cannot be sunk,” Shapiro put forward a vision of Ukraine as a hyper-militarized NATO bastion whose national identity would be defined by its ability to project U.S. power against Russia.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky visits the Western Wall in Jerusalem, January 2020
Israel and Ukraine: “Old, Loyal Friends”
Despite Israel’s reluctance to join the Western sanctions campaign against Russia, it has aided Ukraine’s militarily, sending two large shipments of defensive equipment since February of this year. In the past, however, Israel’s support for Ukraine in its fight against Russia has been more than defensive.
Back in 2018, over 40 human rights activists petitioned the Israeli High Court of Justice to stop arming Ukraine after members of the neo-nazi Azov Battalion were caught brandishing Israeli-made weapons. As Israel’s Ha’aretz noted at the time, “The militia’s [Azov] emblems are well-known national socialist ones. Its members use the Nazi salute and carry swastikas and SS insignias… One militia member said in an interview that he was fighting Russia since Putin was a Jew.”
Zelensky, a Ukrainian Jew, was apparently unperturbed by Israel’s alleged arming of Nazi elements in his country. One year after his 2019 election, he made a pilgrimage to Jerusalem to launch what he called a “prayer for peace,” and to attend an event titled, “Remember the Holocaust to fight anti-Semitism.” Ahead of the junket, Zelensky heaped praise on Israeli society, remarking in an interview that “Jews managed to build a country, to elevate it, without anything except people and brains,” and that Israelis are a “united, strong, powerful people. And despite being under the threat of war, they enjoy every day. I’ve seen it.”
Happy Birthday, @netanyahu! I wish you and all the Jewish people good health and the strength to face all the challenges of the rapidly-changing world. At a time like this, old loyal friends are more valuable than ever. #Ukraine and #Israel have a friendship such as this. pic.twitter.com/jhonXgiqAl
“There are many countries in the world that can protect themselves, but Israel, such a small country, can not only protect itself, but facing external threats, can respond,” Zelensky said, adding that he had visited the country “many times.”
In a birthday message later that year to Israel’s then-Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, Zelensky commented that “old loyal friends are more valuable than ever. Ukraine and Israel have a friendship such as this.”
Since the escalation in fighting between Kiev and Moscow in February of this year, dozens of Israelis have traveled to Ukraine to join the country’s Foreign Legion.
More and more Israeli soldiers are showing up in Ukraine, ready to fight against the Russian Army.
In August, the Canadian government-backed Kyiv Independent published an investigation which accused Ukraine’s Foreign Legion of stealing arms and goods as well as carrying out sexual harassment and other forms of abuse.
Meanwhile, Zelensky has continually heaped praise on Tel Aviv, especially after an Israeli Supreme Court decision to lift restrictions on citizens traveling to Ukraine.
“The rule of law and respect for human rights is exactly what distinguishes a true, developed democracy!” the Ukrainian President tweeted following the July ruling.
I commend the decision of the Supreme Court of the State of Israel, which obliges the government of 🇮🇱 to abolish any additional restrictions on the entry of citizens of 🇺🇦. The rule of law and respect for human rights is exactly what distinguishes a true, developed democracy!
— Володимир Зеленський (@ZelenskyyUa) July 3, 2022
A Hyper-Militarized Apartheid State As a Model for Ukraine
By April of 2022, Zelensky’s admiration for the Israeli state had apparently reached new heights. Immediately following his declaration that Ukraine would soon become “a big Israel,” Washington’s former ambassador to Tel Aviv, Daniel B. Shapiro, published a blueprint for Zelensky to achieve that dream at the Washington D.C.-based, NATO-sponsored Atlantic Council.
“By adapting their country’s mindset to mirror aspects of Israel’s approach to chronic security challenges, Ukrainian officials can tackle critical national-security challenges with confidence and build a similarly resilient state,” Shapiro, an Atlantic Council “distinguished fellow,” wrote.
The nearly 900-word outline offered eight bullet points detailing how Ukraine can become more like Israel, a country recently described by Amnesty International as an “apartheid state.” The points included advice such as to place “security first,” maintain “Intelligence dominance,” and remember that “technology is key.”
According to Shapiro, a central component of Israel’s security strategy is that “the whole population plays a role.”
“Civilians recognize their responsibility to follow security protocols and contribute to the cause,” Shapiro wrote of the Israeli population. “Some even arm themselves (though under strict supervision) to do so. The widespread mobilization of Ukrainian society in collective defense suggests that the country has this potential.” These comments align directly with Zelensky’s prediction that in a future Ukraine, “people with weapons” will be present in nearly every aspect of civilian life.
Like the propaganda touting Israel’s “success” as a security state, Shapiro’s blueprint imagined Ukraine’s citizenry united by a “common purpose” with help from Tel Aviv’s “high-tech innovation” in the military and intelligence sectors. His game plan portrays Israel’s advancements in security to as an almost mythical achievement owing purely to the feisty, innovative spirit of its citizens, overlooking the single greatest material factor in its success: unprecedented levels of foreign military assistance, particularly from the United States. Indeed, without U.S. taxpayers virtually subsidizing its military through yearly aid packages amounting to untold billions of dollars, it is difficult to see how a country the size of New Jersey would have attained the status of the world’s leading surveillance technology hub.
Even as Shapiro urged Zelensky to maintain “active defense partnerships,” he simultaneously downplayed the role foreign aid has played in preserving Israel’s settler-colonial imperatives, arguing that the “single principle” informing Tel Aviv’s security doctrine is that “Israel will defend itself, by itself—and rely on no other country to fight its battles.”
Shapiro must have forgotten that principle when he tweeted, “Thank God Israel has Iron Dome”—a reference to Israel’s air defense system that U.S. taxpayers funded to the tune of $1 billion in 2021 alone, on top of $3.8 billion in military assistance earmarked for Tel Aviv that year.
Thank God Israel has Iron Dome to protect its citizens from Hamas rocket from Gaza. But Israel's ability to defend itself doesn't in any way lessen the outrage of a terrorist organization firing at civilians from within civilian areas.
In his advice to Zelensky, Shapiro also emphasized that “Ukraine will need to upgrade its intelligence services” in a similar manner to Israel, which “has invested deeply in its intelligence capabilities to ensure that it has the means to detect and deter its enemies—and, when needed, act proactively to strike them.”
Then-Amb. Daniel Shapiro speaking at the 2016 conference of the Israeli Institute for National Security Studies, which would later employ him.
A U.S. Diplomat Stays Behind in Israel, Goes to Bat for Its Top Spying Firm
Shapiro would know a thing or two about the Israeli intelligence apparatus. In mid-2017, after opting to remain with his family in Israel, rather than return to the country that had employed him as a diplomat, he joined the Israeli tech firm NSO hacking firm as an independent advisor. There, Shapiro helped evaluate potential clients for NSO’s notoriously invasive digital spyware, known as Pegasus. NSO’s many government clients include the Saudi Monarchy, which has used its Pegasus system to monitor and persecute human rights campaigners and journalists.
Shapiro has also enjoyed close ties with Israeli intelligence through the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS) think tank in Tel Aviv. During the better part of his four years as a “Distinguished Visiting Fellow” at the institute, its executive director was Amos Yadlin, the Israeli Defense Forces’ former chief of Military Intelligence. Yadlin helped devise the doctrine of disproportionate force employed by the Israeli military against Gaza in which civilians were redefined as the “terrorists’ neighbor,” and thereby stripped of protections under the Geneva Conventions.
In 2018, INSS paid Shapiro more than $20,000 to testify before Congress on its behalf, despite him not registering as a foreign agent. Like NSO Group, INSS maintains a veneer of independence from the Israeli government even though its founder, Aharon Yariv, also served as the head of Israel’s military intelligence.
In the US, Shapiro had a stint at WestExec Advisors, a consulting founded in 2017 by now-Secretary of State Anthony Blinken and described by Politico as “Biden’s Cabinet in waiting.” Prior to the election of Joe Biden, Shapiro ran cover in the media after the Democratic Party’s platform removed language opposing further annexation of land in the occupied Palestinian West Bank.
War—It’s Good for Atlantic Council Donors
It is likely no coincidence that Shapiro published his prescription for converting Ukraine into an Israeli-style security state in his capacity as a “distinguished fellow” at the Atlantic Council. If Ukraine is ever transformed into the permanent military fortress he and Zelensky imagine, the NATO think tank’s weapons industry donors stand to benefit immensely.
Lockheed Martin, Raytheon and Boeing were all listed among the Atlantic Council’s top benefactors in 2021. Raytheon Chairman and CEO Gregory J. Hayes also happens to sit on the think tank’s international advisory board. As Max Blumenthal reported for The Grayzone, the Atlantic Council has also served as a de facto laundromat for money from Ukrainian interests like Burisma to members of Biden’s inner circle.
The three aforementioned arms companies, which form the heart of Washington’s military industrial complex, have already reaped massive profits from the war in Ukraine. Boeing, which faced a public relations crisis after malfunctions in its 737 Max plane’s operating system resulted in two high profile crashes, could be on track to reclaiming its status as the world’s top aircraft manufacturer as a result of the conflict.
Though Boeing suffered two consecutive quarterly losses in 2022, by July it claimed to be “building momentum” for a recovery. In June, the aerospace giant secured a contract to supply heavy-lift helicopters to Germany’s government after Berlin created a $107 billion fund for military investment in direct response to the Ukraine war.
Meanwhile, Raytheon and Lockheed Martin both manufacture the Javelin anti-tank missile system that have been dubbed a “symbol of Ukraine’s resistance” on the battlefield.
During his visit to Lockheed Martin's Troy, Alabama plant, Joe Biden pushed for approval of his proposed $33 billion military aid package to Ukraine by claiming Ukrainians were naming their children "Javelin" and "Javelina" after the anti-tank missile the plant manufactured. pic.twitter.com/zNPiKRjSrw
“They’ve been so important, there’s even a story about Ukrainian parents naming their children—not a joke—their newborn child ‘Javelin’ or ‘Javelina,’” U.S. President Joe Biden gushed during a May visit to a Lockheed Martin plant in Troy, Alabama, underscoring the company’s vital role in the Ukraine war with absurdity.
The United States has sent more than 8,500 Javelin anti-tank systems to Ukraine since February at a cost of roughly $178,000 a pop, according to the Pentagon’s 2021 budget. Eager to keep the gravy train flowing, Lockheed Martin is seeking to double production, aiming to manufacture 4,000 Javelin systems a year. Lockheed’s 2022 stocks are up more than 20 percent over the previous year, reaching their height just two weeks after Russia’s military operation began.
With inspiration from Shapiro’s NATO-sponsored “road map” to success, Zelensky’s fantasy of a perpetual militarized, high-tech Sparta bolstered by a gun-toting civilian population will require a massive investment in weapons and surveillance technology on the part of the government in Kiev. If this war is any indication, Ukraine will likely look to the Atlantic Council’s donors once again as it ventures to fulfill Zelensky’s dream of establishing a “big Israel” on Russia’s border.
Alex Rubinstein is an independent reporter on Substack. You can subscribe to get free articles from him delivered to your inbox here. If you want to support his journalism, which is never put behind a paywall, you can give a one-time donation to him through PayPal or sustain his reporting through Patreon. He can be followed on Twitter at @RealAlexRubi.
Several thousand people marched in Philadelphia on May 15 against the state-sanctioned violence, settler-colonialism and apartheid occurring in Sheikh Jarrah and all of Occupied Palestine / credit: Joe Piette
Editor’s Note: The following is the writer’s opinion.
Israeli Ambassador to the United Nations Gilad Erdan is leading his country’s anti-Palestinian propaganda, this time engaging in pre-emptive hasbara in anticipation of a Palestinian response to the ongoing evictions in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah.
“Would you consider it a terror attack if a rock like this was thrown at your car while driving with your children?” Erdan asked the United Nations Security Council members, while holding the rock in his hands. “Would you, at the very least, condemn these brutal terror attacks carried out against Israeli civilians by Palestinians?”
This Israeli logic is quite typical, where oppressed Palestinians are depicted to be the aggressor, and oppressive Israel – a racist apartheid state by any standard – presents itself as a victim merely engaging in defending its own citizens.
But Erdan’s selective logic is, this time around, compelled by something else. His UN charade is merely aimed at creating a distraction from the ongoing horrific events transpiring in Sheikh Jarrah and throughout occupied East Jerusalem. On Wednesday, January 19, the Palestinain Salhiya family’s home was demolished by Israel, rendering 15 people, mostly children, homeless.
A few days earlier, a heart-wrenching event took place on top of that very site, when members of the Salhiya family threatened to set themselves ablaze as they agonized over the imminent loss of their family home.
“We have nothing left for us in Jerusalem. This is ethnic cleansing. Today me, tomorrow my neighbors. We’d rather die on our land with dignity than surrender to them,” Mahmoud Salhiya, the owner of the house said, before he was dissuaded by neighbors not to set himself on fire.
These tragic events are being watched closely, first by Palestinians and also by people around the world. If the momentum of Israeli destruction continues, chances are we could witness another popular uprising. Erdan’s spectacle at the UN is a desperate act of propaganda to sway members of the international community from criticizing Israel.
But Israel is failing at making a case for itself, similar to its failure to defend its horrific violence against Palestinians throughout occupied Palestine in May 2021. Even Israel’s traditional allies are speaking out against the latest round of ethnic cleansing in Sheikh Jarrah.
The US envoy to the United Nations expressed ‘concern’ over the forced expulsion in the Palestinian neighborhood. “To make progress, both Israel and the Palestinian Authority must refrain from unilateral steps that exacerbate tensions and undercut efforts to advance a negotiated two-state solution,” Linda Thomas-Greenfield said, using the usually guarded language. However, Thomas-Greenfield went on to warn against the “annexations of territory, settlement activity, demolitions and evictions – like what we saw in Sheikh Jarrah.”
A view of the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood in East Jerusalem / credit David Shankbone
Also on January 19, US lawmaker, Rep. Mark Pocan strongly criticized the Israeli decision to forcefully evict the Salhiya family in Sheikh Jarrah.
“Last night, in the cover of darkness & freezing cold, the homes of the Salhiyeh family in Sheikh Jarrah, Jerusalem, were destroyed by Israeli forces leaving 15 people homeless. This is unacceptable and must end,” Pocan tweeted, adding the popular hashtag #Savesheikhjarrah.
For his part, the UN Middle East special envoy, Tor Wennsland, strongly condemned the expulsion of the Palestinian family by Israeli occupation authorities.
“I call on Israeli authorities to end the displacement and eviction of Palestinians, in line with its obligations under international law, and to approve additional plans that would enable Palestinian communities to build legally and address their development needs,” the UN website reported Wennesland as saying.
Back to Erdan’s display, where he showcased Palestinian ‘terrorism’ by presenting the supposedly damning evidence of a rock.
It must be said that criticizing or defending Palestinian resistance, however symbolic, allows Israel to engage in a misleading and frivolous conversation that creates a moral equivalence between the occupier and the occupied, the colonialist and the colonized.
Whether Palestinians use a stone, a gun or a clenched fist to resist and defend themselves, their resistance is morally and legally justifiable. Israel, on the other hand, like all other military occupiers and colonialists, has neither a moral nor a legal argument to justify its oppression of Palestinians, the destruction of their homes – like that of the Salhiya family – and the killing of their children.
Judging by the growing solidarity with Palestinians everywhere, it is clear that Erdan’s pathetic display is just another exercise in political futility.
Nothing that Israel can say or do will alter the glaring reality, that a new generation of Palestinians is, once again, unifying the Palestinian discourse, namely around Palestinian resistance to the Israeli occupation. Whether Israeli oppression is happening in Sheikh Jarrah, in Gaza, or the Naqab desert, Palestinians now collectively respond as one unified political body. Thanks to the May 2021 rebellion, gone are the days in which Palestinians are expelled from their homes in the middle of the night as if a routine event, with no consequence.
Moreover, the political language that is being used to describe events in Palestine in the international arena is itself changing. Israel’s ‘right to defend itself’ is no longer the knee-jerk reaction that is often used to describe Israeli violence and Palestinian resistance.
And finally, it seems that Israel is no longer the party shaping events in Palestine and controlling the discourse around these events. Palestinians, and a growing international movement of supporters, are proactively shaping global perceptions of the realities on the ground. Neither Erdan nor his bosses in Tel Aviv can reverse this Palestinian-led momentum. His UN display merely reflects the degree of desperation and intellectual bankruptcy of Israel and its representatives.
Ramzy Baroud is a journalist and the Editor of The Palestine Chronicle. He is the author of six books. His forthcoming book, co-edited with Ilan Pappé, is “Our Vision for Liberation: Engaged Palestinian Leaders and Intellectuals Speak out.” Dr. Baroud is a Non-resident Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Islam and Global Affairs (CIGA). His website is ramzybaroud.net.
Mahmoud Al-Hajj, a third-generation Palestinian resident of his home (seen here) in the Um Haroun section of the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood of East Jerusalem / credit: Jessica Buxbaum
Correction: The Jerusalem mayor’s first name was incorrect in an earlier version. The Israel Land Fund replied to the reporter’s inquiry a week after publication to confirm King is no longer involved with the organization in an official capacity.
EAST JERUSALEM, Palestine—Once a mainstream headline, the protests at Sheikh Jarrah are now considered old news. But the threat of displacement still looms over the East Jerusalem neighborhood as new settler building projects could demolish existing homes and leave residents homeless within months.
Under the guise of urban renewal, the Israel Land Fund (ILF), a settler organization Jerusalem Deputy Mayor Arieh King leads, has initiated three building projects for Sheikh Jarrah. They are intended to double the number of settlers.
Construction is set to begin as early as next year and includes approximately 20 housing units plus an office building. If implemented, the housing-unit plans call for razing current residential buildings and evicting six Palestinian families in the Um Haroun section of Sheikh Jarrah. The six-story office building is designated for an empty plot at Sheikh Jarrah’s entrance. ILF did not respond to requests for comment.
The building plans were frozen for years until 2017, when U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration declared Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and moved the U.S. embassy to the city. By 2019, all three projects received final approval from the Jerusalem District Planning Committee.
Building permits haven’t been issued yet, but actions recently have been taken to obtain the permits at Jerusalem’s planning and licensing department. Building permit requests can be processed within weeks or months.
A map depicting the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood within East Jerusalem / credit: The National
Settlers and the State Working Hand in Hand
Um Haroun is home to 40 Palestinian families. Settler groups, collaborating for years with the Israeli government, have put them at risk of forced expulsion.
“Arieh King is using his power as deputy mayor to bypass this settler plan,” Palestinian resident Mahmoud Al-Hajj told Toward Freedom.
Like the rest of the families in Um Haroun, he’s descended from Palestinians driven from their homes in West Jerusalem and throughout Palestine as the state of Israel was being established in 1948. Al-Hajj’s family originally came from what is now the Old City of Jerusalem’s Jewish Quarter. The Jordanian government gave these homes in Um Haroun to the Palestinian refugees. But today, Israel’s Absentees’ Property Law allows Jews to reclaim these buildings. The legislation permits Jews to return to family properties lost during the violence of 1948, but it doesn’t apply the same standard to Palestinians who were displaced.
According to Al-Hajj, prior to 1948, the properties in Um Haroun were owned by three Palestinian families and rented out to Jews. In that regard, Al-Hajj claims, settler organizations like the ILF are now seeking out the descendants of previous Jewish tenants and urging them to retake these properties.
Additionally, under a 2018 government decision, Israeli authorities recently completed registering land rights to alleged Jewish owners without Palestinian residents’ knowledge. The registration prerequisite in obtaining building permits—The areas in question in Um Haroun are now registered as being owned by Israeli company, Beit Urim, and U.S.-based company, Debraly. Chaim Silberstein, founder and chairman of settler organization, Keep Jerusalem, is listed as Debraly’s representative in the building permit request’s file.
Silberstein has been active in attempts to steal land from Palestinians in Sheikh Jarrah, including trying to seize a yard belonging to the Salem family in Um Haroun. According to Al-Hajj, Silberstein tried in 2005 to use the Absentees’ Property Law to evict Al-Hajj from his home. However, the court ruled against Silberstein, citing Al-Hajj’s family’s status as protected tenants. Under Israeli law, they are allowed to remain in the home for three generations. Al-Hajj, now 55, is a third-generation tenant. Silberstein did not respond to press inquiries.
Yet, as Aviv Tatarsky, researcher with Israeli nonprofit Ir Amim, explained, the Al-Hajj family’s protected tenancy can become null if building owners wish to implement urban renewal projects. That is what settler plans in Um Haroun are considered.
A view of the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood in East Jerusalem / credit David Shankbone
‘There’s No Protection for Us’
The threat of eviction and home demolitions aren’t the only problems plaguing Sheikh Jarrah. Last month, Israeli parliament member and potentially the next public security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, brandished a gun when Palestinians with rocks confronted him and a group of stone-throwing settlers.
“[Israel] practices all types of pressure to bypass this plan through sending court orders, through not allowing us to renovate our houses,” Al-Hajj said. “But the second part of the pressure is arresting our children.”
More than 20 Palestinians were injured in October’s settler assault, including Muhammad Zahran, who suffered head injuries. While two Israelis were arrested for the alleged attack against Zahran, 15 Palestinians were arrested for the October clashes, according to Al-Hajj. Israeli police did not verify the number of people arrested, but they said all who were detained were Israelis holding Israeli IDs. However, reports indicate both Palestinians and Jews were arrested, as seen here and here.
“There’s no protection for us, neither from courts or police,” Al-Hajj said.
As former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is expected to return to power and form Israel’s most right-wing coalition in its history, Al-Hajj sees no difference between the politicians leading now and in the past.
“It doesn’t matter if it was an extreme right-wing government or not. We look at it as it’s going to be the same policies against Palestinians, and especially Sheikh Jarrah,” Al-Hajj said. “What else would we have other than being expelled from our houses?”
Jessica Buxbaum is a Jerusalem-based freelance journalist reporting on Palestine and the Israeli occupation. You can follow her on Twitter at @jess_buxbaum.
