Israeli plan for Jerusalem centers on destruction of Palestinian life in capital

Date: 05 / 05 / 2009  Time:  11:01
Bethlehem – Ma’an –

Mayor for the Israeli occupation government-run Jerusalem municipality hopes to make “Jerusalem the greenest city in Israel,” largely at the expenses of Palestinian residents.

Jerusalem municipal Mayor Nir Barkat revealed his “master plan” for the city on Monday, which includes the ominous pledge for the “Development of eastern Jerusalem,” where most of the Palestinian population lives.

Also of concern to Palestinian residents is his intention to create five new metropolitan parks, particularly given the current demolition orders on nearly 100 Palestinian homes in the Silwan neighborhood of the city to make way for the construction of green space.

Equally distressing is the issue of Israeli “Conservation and preservation of historic buildings,” since this often means the judization of Islamic or ancient historic sites.

In his explanation of “Developing Eastern Jerusalem,” Barakat said “An additional 13,550 housing units will be made available for construction for the residents of eastern Jerusalem,” which means the expansion of illegal East Jerusalem Israeli settlements. These settlements will be constructed on the land Palestinians will establish their capital city on under the Road Map and Arab Peace Initiative.

The mayor said he intended to build most of the new housing in the Palestinian A-Tur neighborhood (1,500 units), the Palestinian Beit Hanina- Shu'afat neighborhoods (2,500 units), Tel Adesa (2,000 units), Jabal Al-Mukabber (2,500 units), and the eastern Jerusalem city center (750 units). These areas house the highest number of Palestinian residents of East Jerusalem.

Barakat outlined his plans for the revitalization of tourism in Jerusalem, saying efforts would be concentrated on the Old City, again an area of high-concentration Palestinian homes.

According to reports, “The plan affixes the borders of the historical city to include the neighborhoods and buildings built until 1948,” which will annex even more Palestinian land.

Khudari: IOG judaization rapidly, seriously escalating

 [ 04/05/2009 - 07:30 PM ]

GAZA, (PIC)--

MP Jamal Al-Khudari, the head of the popular committee against the siege, on Monday championed Arab, Islamic and international stand against the Israeli occupation authority's accelerated steps to judaize occupied Jerusalem.

He said in a statement that the Israeli occupation government (IOG) was confiscating Palestinian lands, annexing them to settlements, demolishing Palestinian homes and constructing roads at an increasing pace.

The lawmaker said that the IOG practices in occupied Jerusalem and the West Bank necessitated a unified Palestinian stand and moves by all concerned parties because the situation was "very serious" and could not be met with silence.

Khudari called for massive rallies and marches to oppose the IOG judaization of Jerusalem and its persecution of the Palestinian people.

For its part, the Palestinian center for human rights strongly condemned the Zionist scheme of annexing the Kidar settlement to that of Ma'aleh Adumim east of occupied Jerusalem and confiscating around 12,000 dunums of Palestinian lands for this purpose.

The center urged the world community especially the signatories to the fourth Geneva convention to shoulder their legal and ethical responsibilities and to live up to their commitments.

The international silence was only encouraging the IOG to act as a state above the law and to commit more violations of the international laws, it warned.

Meanwhile, the IOG on Monday issued a new batch of administrative demolition orders of Palestinian homes in the Old City of Jerusalem and in the suburbs of Wadi Al-Joz and Ras Al-Amoud.

Illegal Israeli settlers uproot, cut, dozens of trees near Ramallah

Tuesday May 05, 2009 10:54 by IMEMC & Agencies

Palestinian sources reported on Monday evening that a group of illegal Israeli extremist settlers uprooted and cut dozens of olive and fig trees belonging to residents of Sinjil village, near the central West Bank city of Ramallah.

The sources added that the fig and olive trees are located in Al-Maghribat area in the village, and belong to resident Shawki Hasan Ghafry, a father to four children with special needs.

Furthermore, the settlers also cut olive trees belonging to residents, Ali-Hussain Foqaha, Adeeb Hussain Foqaha, Hussain Khalil, and the Mohammad Khalil.

 It is worth mentioning that is subjected to repeated attacks carried out by extremist settlers as five settlements were illegally constructed of village lands.