The occupied City of Jerusalem is now facing the fiercest Israeli colonial campaign since it had been occupied by force in June 1967, which aims to empty the city from its Palestinian residents through the demolition of Palestinian houses, expansion of the existing Illegal Israeli settlements and neglecting Palestinian residents' rights and needs for urban expansion and suitable infrastructure; On the other hand, Israel is mobilizing all efforts for the interest of Jewish settlers living in the city to ensure the Israeli-Jewish sovereignty, and demographic supremacy over the occupied city as their eternal-undivided capital of the State of Israel.

Simultaneously, and at the beginning of the year 2009, Barack Obama was elected for the presidency of the United States and Binyamin Netanyahu took office as the Israeli Prime Minister. Obama and his Administration put in their priority the resumption of negotiations between the Palestinians and the Israelis on the basis of the previously signed agreements with all their commitments,  mainly to freeze construction in Israeli settlements in West Bank and most particular in occupied East Jerusalem including the natural growth; however, Netanyahu refused the US demand to freeze the building in the settlements especially in east Jerusalem and tried to manipulate the US Administration and the International community by declaring in November 27,2009 a settlement freeze in the West Bank, excluding occupied East Jerusalem to allow the continuation of construction and planning in the Israeli settlements in east Jerusalem, contrary to what had been agreed upon during the Road Map plan for peace which included the halt of constructions in all of the Israeli settlements in West Bank and Jerusalem including the natural growth.

 

From the Beginning of the Year 2010 until now, the Planning and Construction Committee of the Israeli Municipality of Jerusalem had approved 3 colonial plans in the city, the first plan is to construct a purification pool in Ras Al Amoud settlement in east Jerusalem and has allocated NIS 250 thousand for the construction of this project to serve 140 Jewish families living in the settlement; the second plan included the construction of four new residential buildings adjacent to Beit Orot religious school in East Jerusalem, effectively creating a new Jewish neighborhood to house 24 Jewish families on the Mount of Olives; and a third plan for the construction of a new Jewish neighborhood in the north-east of Shu’fat neighborhood. Three five-story buildings will be built to house some 50 Jewish families. The entrance level to the buildings will be designated for commerce.

 

Ma’ale David

On January 8, 2010, the Israeli daily newspaper reported that the Construction and Planning Committee of the Israeli Municipality of Jerusalem will approve in the coming few weeks the building of a new Israeli settlement comprising 100 housing units, to be built on the site of the former Israeli police station headquarter in the Palestinian neighborhood of Ras Al-‘Amoud in the eastern part of the city of Jerusalem.

 

The new Israeli settlement which is called “Ma’ale David” or “Ma’alot David” is to be built on 11 dunums of lands on and around the former Police site.  It is worth mentioning that Ma’alot David’s construction was stalled for several months while a new building for the police department was under construction in the E1 area near the Illegal Israeli settlement of Ma’ale Adumim, opposite to the Palestinian town of Abu Dis in occupied east Jerusalem. The latest illegal housing compound is situated 300 meters from another Israeli neighborhood called Ma’ale Ha- Zeitim, on the Mount of Olives. Right wing Israeli activist Arieh King, who first called for the construction of Ma’ale Ha-Zeitim, said that Ma’alot David was not an expansion to the already existing settlement, but rather an independent build.  See the Maps 1 & 2 below:

 

Map 1& Map 2: Location of the Old E1 Police Headquarter in Ras Al Amoud area and the new E1
police Headquarter in Ma'ale Adumim settlement.

 

 Legal & International Status

From 1967 and following the Israeli military occupation of the Palestinian lands, and Israel is refusing to comply to the International law rules and conventions and to the United Nation Security Council Resolutions UNSCRs concerning the building and expanding the Illegal Israeli settlements in the OPT including East Jerusalem, despite the fact that their existence are Illegal and constitute a grave breach of the International Law. Furthermore, Israel is deliberately expanding the settlements and their outposts and building a new of them especially in Jerusalem in an attempt to impose facts on the ground to undermine the status of the city of Jerusalem as a future capital of the State of Palestine.

Article XXXI of the 1995 Oslo agreement provides that: Israelis forbidden from building or planning to any project or settlements or any colonial expansion or any plan that lead to change the status of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. The article provides “Neither side shall initiate or take any step that will change the status of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip pending the outcome of the permanent status negotiations”.

Furthermore the Forth Geneva Convention also states in Article 49 that “The occupying power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own population into the territories it occupies.

In May 2001, the head of the International Red Cross delegation to Israel and the Occupied Territories said that settlements are 'equal in principle to war crimes'. (Note: 'The transfer, the installation of population of the occupying power into the occupied territories is considered as an illegal move and qualified as a 'grave breach.' It's a grave breach, formally speaking, but grave breaches are equal in principle to war crimes', Rene Kosirnik, head of the ICRC delegation to Israel and the OPT, press conference 17 May 2001.)

The  existence of the Israeli settlements in the West Bank and their expansions are Illegal and contradicts with the international law rules, United Nations Security Council Resolutions such as 237 (1967), 271 (1969), 446 (1979),  452 (1979) ,465 (1980.

Resolution 446 March 22, 1979 calls on Israel to rescind its previous measures and to desist from taking any action which would result in changing the legal status and geographical nature and materially affecting the demographic composition of the Arab territories occupied since 1967, including Jerusalem and, in particular, not to transfer parts of its own civilian population into the occupied Arab territories' .

Also the resolution 452 of the 1979 “calls upon the Government and people of Israel to cease, on an urgent basis, the establishment, construction and planning of settlements in the Arab territories occupied since 1967, including Jerusalem.

 

 

 

 

 

Prepared by:
The Applied Research Institute – Jerusalem