(21 Jan 2022) Palestinians and human rights activists protested on Friday in the tense Jerusalem neighbourhood of Sheikh Jarrah following an eviction of a Palestinian family whose home was then demolished.
Israeli police evicted the family from the disputed property in on Wednesday before demolishing the building and leaving some 15 people homeless on a cold, rainy day.
The Salhiya family said they purchased the property before 1967, while the state has argued against the family's claims in court.
The municipality said the land was always zoned for public use, but is also privately owned by other Arab parties whom it declined to name.
Jerusalem City Hall said it will compensate the rightful owners and will build a special needs school on the plot to serve the Palestinian community in the neighbourhood.
It said the Salhiya family is squatting on the land and that the buildings were constructed illegally in the 1990s.
The case has been in court for several years, and a Jerusalem judge last year ruled in favour of the city and authorized the eviction.
The family has appealed and is awaiting a ruling, but the judge did not freeze the eviction order.
Palestinians in east Jerusalem say it is almost impossible to get building authorization from the city, forcing them to build homes without permits or to move to the occupied West Bank.
Dozens of Palestinian families in east Jerusalem are at risk of eviction by Jewish settler organizations, and thousands face the threat of demolition because of discriminatory policies that make it extremely difficult for Palestinians to build new homes or expand existing ones.
Other threatened evictions in Sheikh Jarrah and other neighbourhoods, which are tied up in decades-old legal battles between Palestinian residents and Jewish settlers, set off protests and clashes last year that eventually helped ignite the Gaza war.
Israel captured east Jerusalem, along with the West Bank, in the 1967 Mideast war and annexed it in a move not recognized by most of the international community.

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