Israel to build 700 units in J'lem area settlements

[ProgressiveMuslim]

Published today (updated) 28/12/2009 11:44



According to the Israeli daily Haaretz, government spokesman Mark Regev said the Israeli Housing Ministry invited contractors to bid on the construction of 198 housing units in the settlement Pisgat Ze’ev, 377 in Neve Ya'akov and 117 in Har Homa.

Israel occupied East Jerusalem along with the rest of the West Bank in 1967. It later annexed the city and regards it as an absorbed part of Israel. Palestinians and the international community never recognized Israeli sovereignty in the east of the city.

In 1967 Israel also expanded Israel’s municipal boundaries, such that many of what Israel terms ‘East Jerusalem settlements’ actually lie deep in the West Bank. Har Homa for example is situated closer to Bethlehem than Jerusalem.

"We make a distinction between the West Bank and Jerusalem. Jerusalem is our capital and remains such," Regev said on Monday, as quoted by Haaretz.



House demolitions

In a related warning on Israel’s plans for Jerusalem, Fatah official Hatem Abdul Qader said on Wednesday that Israel is planning to bulldoze 900 Palestinian houses in the city.

“The plan was given to a private firm to demolish the houses and building housing units and settlements in the Old City in Jerusalem," Abdul Qader told Voice of Palestine radio.

"The plan is based on reducing the Palestinian presence in Jerusalem," he added.

Haaretz also reported on Sunday that the Israeli state is considering expropriating privately-owned Palestinian land in order to build a sewage treatment facility that would serve the West Bank settlement of Ofra.

more...
http://www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=250209

[ProgressiveProfessor]

1. Har Homa is somewhat different that the rest of listed areas

Its south of Jerusalem and not in what is normally called east Jerusalem. Its is on the Jordanian side of the 1948 border.

Har Homa is mostly forested unoccupied land.

75% of the land was expropriated from Israelis, the remainder from non Israeli owners.

When it got going in the mid-late 90s, it is supposed to house both Arabs and Jews roughly proportionately to the percentage in Jerusalem. Not sure where that stands today.

[Violet_Crumble]

2. That's totally incorrect. It's within the municipal boundaries of Jerusalem...

There are no excuses for that settlement and it's just a bit disturbing that yr attempting to justify what is a blatant violation of international law in yr post...

Har Homa is a neighborhood that lies within the municipal boundaries of the City of Jerusalem. Palestinians as well as the United Nations and European Union contend that this neighborhood is an illegal settlement because it was entirely built on land southeast of the Jordanian-Israeli cease-fire line (the "Green Line") drawn at the conclusion of the 1948 war. They argued that it completed a ring of Israeli settlements around Jerusalem and sealed off the city from the Palestinians (Applied Research Institute of Jerusalem Website), and that it violated the Oslo Accords because it created facts on the ground which predetermine final status negotiations (Palestinian National Authority Official Website).

Israel has responded to these claims by pointing out that the land is within the city limits of Jerusalem (unlike neighboring Beit Sahour, under Palestinian Authority jurisdiction) and therefore legally subject to municipal development, and that most of Har Homa's land was owned by Jews prior to its conquest by Jordan in 1948.<8> Israel has pointed out to its critics that the land was unoccupied and undeveloped prior to the construction of the Har Homa neighborhood; that both Jewish and Arab landholders were compensated for the land; that the Palestinian residents of Beit Sahour would be unable to develop the land in any event as the Oslo agreements specifically barred Palestinian jurisdiction over Jerusalem for the time being.<7>

Palestinian residents of neighboring Beit Sahour, in conjunction with Israeli peace activists, campaigned vigorously against the Municipality's decision to develop the Har Homa neighborhood, setting up what they referred to as an "international peace camp" at the site. While its development was the subject of much international criticism, as well as many organized protests by both local Palestinians and International activists in the late 1990s, Har Homa is now largely completed and most of its population consists of young families seeking affordable housing in Jerusalem.

At the same time that the Municipality of Jerusalem approved the initial 2,500 housing units in Har Homa, it also approved 3,000 housing units<9> and 400 government financed housing units in the Arab neighborhood of Sur Baher, which faces Har Homa. The plans were originally initiated in 1994, but were revisited in May 1997 as a means of balancing the building of the Jewish development at Har Homa (Jerusalem Post, 5/23/97).

Palestinian officials dismissed the construction in Sur Bahir as a ploy aimed at deflecting international criticism set off by the work at Har Homa (Baltimore Sun, 5/23/97).

Having failed through demonstrations to stop the construction and development of the site, the residents of Beit Sahour have petitioned Israel's Supreme Court to return the undeveloped land between Beit Sahour and Har Homa to the Palestinian municipality, and to move the security fence to reflect their ownership of this land.



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Har_Homa

And no-one be going and giving me no shit over using Wikipedia. If it's good enough for my employer to cite when making law, it's good enough for me! :)

[azurnoir]

3. The WH has to do more than move their lips

about how "dismaying" or "unhelpful" this move is, perhaps beginning by taking a closer look at the charities that contribute money to the settlements