JERUSALEM: The Jerusalem mayor has agreed to evacuate a Jewish settlers’ house built illegally in the heart of a predominantly Palestinian neighborhood — but also plans to demolish dozens of Palestinian buildings erected without permission in the area, his spokesman said Thursday.
Sovereignty over the holy city’s traditionally Arab sector is one of the most explosive issues in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Evacuations and demolitions on either side of the political divide have triggered violent showdowns.
Mayor Nir Barkat, who opposes sharing Jerusalem with the Palestinians in any final peace deal, had tried to buck an evacuation order against the seven-story structure, built in 2004 in east Jerusalem’s Silwan area.
But the attorney general’s office backed the order, and forced Barkat to drop his resistance. In a press release, Barkat announced he would evacuate the structure, named after the convicted US spy Jonathan Pollard. The statement also said he had been “forced to take action to carry out all the demolition orders in the Silwan neighborhood.”
Barkat spokesman Stephan Miller said there was no timetable for the evacuation or the demolitions. The municipality said not all of the 200 Palestinian structures were homes, but did not have an immediate breakdown.
Palestinians say they cannot receive proper building permits from Israeli authorities. They say the planned demolitions are meant to assert Israel’s control over the city. “This is a provocation that sabotages the peace process,” said Rafiq Husseini, a top aide to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. “No peace process can survive and no negotiations can begin while people’s homes in Jerusalem are being demolished.”
