Why is tension escalating in Jerusalem? The Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood is a symbol of the Palestinian struggle
English - Wednesday 12 May 2021 الساعة 09:59 pm
Newsyemen, Reuters
A foul smell is in the air in the small Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood in East Jerusalem, where protesters are trying to prevent Israel from expelling eight Palestinian families and allowing Jews to move in.
Last week, Israeli police repeatedly released a foul-smelling liquid known as skunk water that sticks at night in an attempt to disperse the demonstrators.
The confrontation witnessed violent clashes around the old walled city, and on Monday, militants in the Gaza Strip fired rockets, which Israel responded with air strikes on the strip.
Health officials said it resulted in the killing of nine Palestinians.
The confrontation also made Sheikh Jarrah a sign of what the Palestinians see as an Israeli campaign to expel them from East Jerusalem.
The Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood is a tree-lined area with sandstone houses that includes foreign consulates and luxury hotels, about 500 meters from Bab al-Amud, or Bab Damascus, in the Old City.
It was named after the personal physician of Saladin, who liberated Jerusalem from the Crusaders in 1187.
Israel captured the Old City and the rest of East Jerusalem and the adjacent West Bank in the 1967 Middle East war.
It considers all of Jerusalem as its capital, including the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood, which includes a site sacred to religious Jews, which is the tomb of an ancient priest.
Palestinians live in most of the homes of the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood, but Israeli settlers have moved to some of its homes, saying they belonged to Jews before the Arab-Israeli conflict in 1948, which followed the end of the British mandate over Palestine.
Nabil Al-Kurd, who is 77 years old, is one of the Palestinians facing expulsion from Othman Bin Affan Street in the neighborhood after a long court battle.
He said "Israel will not be satisfied until it expels me from the house in which I have lived almost my entire life,".
Israeli settlers took over half of his home after a court battle in 2009.
A wall separates him and his family from the settlers, and his hopes of staying at home are dependent on the Israeli Supreme Court's decision.
Israel has played down the importance of any government intervention, describing it as a real estate dispute between private parties.
* "Settlers get out"
Arab Israeli MPs participated in the protests on Monday, and some of them chanted "settlers get out."
A number of extreme nationalist Israeli politicians confronted them on Othman Ibn Affan Street, and the police kept the two parties separate.
Palestinians have lived in Sheikh Jarrah since Jordan resettled them there in the 1950s, after they fled or were forced to leave their homes in West Jerusalem and Haifa during the fighting during the establishment of Israel in 1948.
The settlers who filed the lawsuit on Othman bin Affan Street said that they purchased the land from two Jewish associations that had bought it at the end of the nineteenth century.
A lower court ruled in favor of settlers under an Israeli law allowing Jews to claim ownership of homes they lost in 1948.
No such law permits Palestinians to do the same in West Jerusalem or any other parts of Israel.
Khaled Hamad, 30, a resident of Sheikh Jarrah, said, "Our families came here as refugees ... It is happening again."
At a settler home across the street, an Israeli said the Supreme Court rewarded the Palestinians when it postponed a hearing on the case amid mounting tensions.
The United States has been among the critics of the expulsion, raising the potential for it to become a diplomatic obstacle to Israel.
Anti-expulsion protests took place in Palestinian cities across the West Bank, and Israeli Arabs organized protests in Haifa and Nazareth.
Arab MP Ahmed Al-Tibi expressed his support by going to Othman Bin Affan Street. Support also spread on social media.
Salem Brahmeh, a member of the Movement for a Youthful Democratic Renewal Generation, said that the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood "is gathering young Palestinians in Palestine and all over the world."
