Palestinian family losing Jerusalem home after five decades

[Violet_Crumble]

JERUSALEM (AFP) — "I was married here, I had my five children here and I want to die here," says a defiant Fawzia al-Kurd, determined that Jewish settlers will not drive her family from their home in occupied east Jerusalem.

But sadly for the Al-Kurds, whose single-storey two-room house of golden stone that has been their home for the past 52 years, Israel's High Court has ruled differently. They are to be expelled, and the house, a wing of which has already been taken over by settlers will be lost forever.

The house, in the Sheikh Jarrah district, has become a symbol of Palestinian resistance against the steady pressure of Jewish settlers seeking to take yet more terrain in east Jerusalem.

It's a hot July afternoon, and Fawzia is sitting outside under a large black tarpaulin stretched from the eves of the house. By her side, lying on mattresses in the shade are two young Swedish activists, ready to act as human shields if the police show up with the eviction order.

Chains and locks hang near the door, ready for them to chain themselves to the window in defiance. Banners on the wall proclaim "We Will Never Leave" and "No Expulsion of Families."

"The settlers threatened us, they offered us millions of dollars to go live somewhere else, but we are staying here," Fawzia says.

But on July 16 the High Court ordered that the Al-Kurds be expelled, the final chapter of a saga that dates back to the creation of Israel 60 years ago.

http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5jlP6g44eRtyV0M4BxoM2nmsdpIvw

[Igel]

1. Thanks.

Every once in a while I see an article about Palestinians wanting properties in W. Jer. back. They focus on how unjust it is that their land was taken without compensation, and how righteous the demands for their property to be returned are.

It made me curious as to the property that belonged to Jews who were expelled from E. Jerusalem by the Jordanians when the Jordanians took over that part of the city, the property seized without compensation.

So at least it's something. Even if it is an article that passes over any morality involved in expropriating their land, but focusing on on how unrighteous Jewish claims for the return of their property are, even mentioning the outrage that the current inhabitants were offered compensation if the Palestinians moved.

I'm constantly reminded that one of Chomsky's heuristics for determining the underlying structure of language is through identifying and examining asymmetries in grammaticality judgments and sentence paradigms, and how the asymmetries allow us to infer important things about human languages and, after you've examined a few human languages, human language. Asymmetries are meaningful in extralinguistic contexts, too.

I hope the supreme court's verdict is reported, too. It'll be interesting to see their reasoning.

[azurnoir]

2. Well then by your own reasoning

any Israeli Arab should be able to go to West Jerusalem or any where else in Israel and reclaim land that was expropriated by Israel. From the article

But in 1967, Israel captured east Jerusalem during the Six Day War, eventually annexing it in defiance of international law and proclaiming the city its "eternal and undivided capital."

After the war a Zionist organization registered under its name the title to three hectares (nearly seven acres) of land in Sheikh Jarrah on which the house sits.

were these organizations the original owners?

and yes we are all familiar with the claims as to why "it's different" when a Israeli Arab does it

[Igel]

5. No, I don't think I actually take a stand on the propriety of

land restoration. If so, it's accidental.

It's the asymmetry I find interesting: When Palestinians march and say they want to reclaim houses, it's an international media event, and everybody considers their claims to be merit-ful and just. When Israeli Jews do the same, it's nearly a badge of dishonor and they're picking on poor Palestinians.

Now for my actual stand for societies with strong communalist tendencies: Tally up the square footage of Jerusalem housing that people from each pertinent ethnic group was evicted from (whether in the late '30s uprising, or the '48 ethnic cleansing, or in '67-'68), and deduct from each area/ethnicity number the square footage occupied at some later by the corresponding ethnicity, necessarily at some arbitrary time point. Say '70.

Example: Let's say that 3000 m2 of E. Jerusalem Jews' housing space was "liberated" by the Jordanians and Palestinians in '48-'49, and the same housing space was "left behind" in W. Jerusalem by expelled Palestinians or those who fled in '48-'49. Assume 0 sq meters chance in '57, for the sake of the example. Formalize the deeds for all 6000 sq m, since it's a wash. If the numbers for W. Jerusalem were 40 sq m and for E. Jerusalem 30 sq m, find some way of compensating Israeli Jews as a group for the additional housing space they lost; if the numbers are reversed, compensate Israeli Arabs in a similar manner.

Yes, it's communal. But much of the argumentation assumes communal rights, not individual rights (except when that makes better PR, and that's simply unjust--find a standard and stick with it).

[Violet_Crumble]

4. The people trying to take over this home aren't original owners...

'The legal battle began some 10 years ago when a settler association called "Nachlat Shimon" (Simon's Estate) bought the disputed title, and 10 Jewish families moved into the neighbourhood.'

They're more nutty religious settlers. There's nothing righteous about a bunch of settlers taking over a home other people have lived in for so many decades, and that the High Court ordered they be expelled makes it even worse...

If the ruling isn't overturned, it's going to open a huge can of worms, because there's a lot of Israeli Arabs who still haven't had their property returned to them, and if they start legal action and don't get the same result, it's going to look a lot like there's one law for religious settlers trying to set up shop in occupied territory and another one for other citizens of Israel trying to reclaim their property in Israel...

[Igel]

6. Original owners, new owners.

I don't see a big difference. It's the property rights of the legal owner, now squatters. It doesn't matter that they're nutty settlers; they bought the deed for pennies on the shekel, so to speak, because the land was disputed. If they can defend the title, they can defend the title. It doesn't matter if they're Christian Arabs or extreme RW Zionists.

The same quibble can be used--and only sometimes is--when it comes to Palestinians. Many of the dispossessed have, at best, seen their former homes that they were last in as small children, or which they were never in, and are still considered (by many) to be dispossessed. They're also not the original owners, but at least have some family stake. But the property rights are the same, whether bought or bequeathed.

Yes, if the ruling isn't overturned it'll open a humongous can of worms. That can of worm is regularly opened for some purposes. I like having it opened in a way that can finally bring resolution, and in a way that calls into question the asymmetry that its current use operates under.

[LeftishBrit]

3. Disgusting IMO

At least they're being offered compensation, but kicking them out after 52 years seems just wrong under the circumstances.