provinceorstate:jerusalem municipality

#Ground_Truth. Destruction and Return in al-’Araqīb

Ground Truth is an ongoing project that aims to provide historical and juridical evidence on behalf of communities in the illegalised Palestinian Bedouin villages in the northern threshold of the Negev/Naqab desert, Israel. While forced physical displacement and illegalisation render these communities non-existent on maps and aerial imaging, state-led land works and afforestation transform and erase their land and material cultural remains. The project aims to document and collate disparate legal, historical, and material evidence for the continuity of the sedentary presence of the Bedouin population on this land, as well as traces of their repeated displacement and destruction by government forces.

At the heart of the project are a community-led photographic dossier and a 3DGiS platform that utilises contemporary and historical images to map the presence and remnants of the Bedouin’s inhabitation. This first iteration of the project centres on the case of the al-’Araqīb village, which has been demolished over 116 times over the past 60 years. A second phase of the project would wish to expand the work into more unrecognised villages where establishing proof of continuity of presence would be helpful.

Through a collaborative process of DIY aerial photography with Public Lab, Zochrot, and the local families of al-’Araqīb, a kind of ’civic satellite’ is formed. We use kites and balloons equipped with simple cameras to form a methodology through which aerial and ground views can be gathered across multiple expeditions. These are assembled through photogrammetry into stacked geo-referenced 3D point-cloud photo terrains. Photographs, taken by residents and activists, document not only expulsion and destruction but also their ongoing life and resistance. These photographs, along with other media, data, and testimony, attest to an inflicted violence by connecting the history of this local land struggle to larger-scale and longer-term environmental transformations and to the conflicts that such changes have provoked.

https://i.imgur.com/t1zOnIv.png

Et le #film :
▻https://vimeo.com/223268224

#destruction #paysage #palestine #Israël #Néguev #cartographie_radicale #contre-cartographie #cartographie_critique #Forensics_Architecture #architecture_forensique #effacement #traces #désert_du_Néguev
#al-Araqib #expropriation #bédouins
ping @sinehebdo @reka @nepthys @albertocampiphoto

Maintaining a Jewish majority: Jerusalem Municipality to demolish entire Palestinian neighborhood, leaving 550 people without a roof over their heads | B’Tselem
►http://www.btselem.org/jerusalem/20190613_wadi_yasul

Ever since 1967, planning policy in Jerusalem has been geared toward establishing and maintaining a Jewish demographic majority in the city. Under this policy, it is nearly impossible to obtain a building permit in Palestinian neighborhoods. The outline plans the city has prepared for these neighborhoods are largely aimed at restricting and limiting building opportunities in Palestinian neighborhoods. One way the plans do so is by designating vast areas as open green spaces, thereby barring Palestinians from building there. The resulting housing shortage forces Palestinian residents to build without permits. At the turn of the millennium, the city estimated that about 20,000 housing units had been built without a permit in East Jerusalem. This estimate was made before the Separation Barrier cut off Kafr Aqab and Shu’fat Refugee Camp from the city. Since that time, many high-rises have been built in those areas.

The justices who heard the appeals that residents filed against the demolition orders issued for their homes chose to follow in the footsteps of all previous Israeli courts. They chose to ignore this policy which has been applied openly for more than fifty years. Instead, they focused solely on the question of whether or not the residents had building permits. District Court Judge Chana Miriam Lomp held that, “the residents have no one to blame but themselves,” as they had chosen to build without a permit and did not wait for planning conditions to change. Supreme Court Justice Yosef Elron refused to consider the residents’ arguments regarding planning discrimination and the fact that the Jerusalem Municipality deliberately avoids promoting a plan that would regulate construction in the area, saying they were not pertinent “to a criminal proceeding hearing.”

’Entrance not permitted to minorities’: Jerusalem City Hall’s discriminatory regulations to kindergartens
The Reform movement in Israel’s advocacy arm is demanding that the city change the instructions it distributed, which violate the law
Nir Hasson | Apr 20, 2019 9:22 PM | Haaretz.com
▻https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-jerusalem-municipality-orders-minorities-be-denied-entry-to-city-s

https://www.haaretz.com/polopoly_fs/1.7143994.1555785205!/image/1072309216.jpg_gen/derivatives/headline_1200x630/1072309216.jpg

The Israel Reform movement’s anti-racism organization is demanding the Jerusalem Municipality immediately cancel instructions ordering kindergarten teachers and support staff deny entry to people belonging to minority groups.

The instructions, published by the emergency and security department of the Jerusalem municipality and distributed to the city’s kindergartens and pre-schools, order that “outsiders many not enter kindergarten premises,” adding that “as a rule, entrance is not permitted to minority groups.”

According to the instructions, if minority groups want to enter the school, “the local security officer must be notified.” In Israel, the Hebrew term “minority groups” usually refers to Arabs and other non-Jews.

In its appeal, the Racism Crisis Center, operated by the Israel Religious Action Center - the advocacy arm of the Reform movement in Israel - said that the municipality instructions to comprehensively prohibit outsiders and non-Jewish minorities from entering kindergartens harm their right to human dignity and equality, and therefore is wrong, illegal and forbidden.

“Arabs in Israel are viewed as dangerous as it is, even in the absence of any real and specific indication that they pose a potential threat. As a result, they become immediate suspects, and are targeted, more than any other sector, due to alleged security reasons which are based on religious and ethnic stereotypes,” the letter states.

“אין לאפשר כניסת זרים לגן. ככל, אין אישור לכניסת מיעוטים”
זו ההוראה של עיירית ירושליםם לגנים. בני מיעוטים, גם אם הינם אזרחי ותושבי המדינה, הם בגדר זרים, ומסוכנים בברירת המחדל!.
בעירייה אמרו שיתקנו את ההוראה - אבל מה עוד צפוי לנו אם הגזען סמוטריץ’ יעמוד בראש משרד החינוך? pic.twitter.com/zOXzCFqpo0
— MK Aida Touma-Sliman (@AidaTuma) April 18, 2019

Tweet by Touma-Sliman with a photo of the Jerusalem Municipality instructions.

The appeal adds that “protecting the security of kindergarten children and personnel is of the utmost importance. However, the security considerations, as important and worthy as they may be, don’t justify the gross discrimination against non-Jews. We request that the municipality reexamine the matter and retract any instruction that discriminates against minorities.”

The Jerusalem municipality said in response that “security procedures for educational facilities are set by the Israel Police and the Education Ministry. The Jerusalem municipality operates in accordance with those procedures. The instructions you are referring to were distributed a year and a half ago. We are grateful for the attention paid to the manner the instruction was written and we will act to fix it soon.”

Arab Member of Knesset Aida Touma-Sliman tweeted in response, “Minority groups, even if they are citizens and residents of the country, are seen as foreigners and dangerous by default … What else awaits us if that racist [MK Bezalel] Smotrich is appointed as head of the education ministry?” - referring to far-right, newly reelected Knesset member, who is said to likely be the next education minister

#apartheid

School Building Demolished in Shu’fat Refugee Camp

Israeli bulldozers, today, demolished an under-construction building belonging to a Palestinian school in the Shu’fat refugee camp of occupied East Jerusalem, on Tuesday.

Dozens of Israeli soldiers escorted bulldozers into the refugee camp, surrounded the al-Razi School and went up rooftops of nearby buildings as drones flew overhead; Israeli bulldozers then began to demolish the school’s building.

Israeli forces fired rubber-coated steel bullets towards locals in the refugee camp.

Muhammad Alqam, owner of the school building, told Ma’an News Agency that Israeli authorities had issued a demolition order against the building last November, pointing out that he had headed to the Israeli Jerusalem Municipality, before the construction of the building, to issue necessary permits. However, he was told that the area belongs to the United Nations Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA.)

Principal of the school, Saleh Alqam, pointed out that the demolition was carried out without prior notice.

He added that 400 Palestinian students had registered for the 2019/2020 school year in the new building, which was supposed to serve kindergarten and elementary students. However, after the demolition, these students now have no place to go.

School was suspended, for Tuesday, for 1500 students of all stages who attend the al-Razi School.

Israel uses the pretext of building without a permit to carry out demolitions of Palestinian-owned homes on a regular basis.

Israel rarely grants Palestinians permits to build in East Jerusalem, though the Jerusalem municipality has claimed that compared to the Jewish population, they receive a disproportionately low number of permit applications from Palestinian communities, which also see high approval ratings.

For Jewish Israelis in occupied East Jerusalem’s illegal settlements, the planning, marketing, development, and infrastructure are funded and executed by the Israeli government. By contrast, in Palestinian neighborhoods, all the burden falls on individual families to contend with a lengthy permit application that can last several years and cost tens of thousands of dollars.

According to Daniel Seidemann of the NGO Terrestrial Jerusalem, “Since 1967, the government of Israel has directly engaged in the construction of 55,000 units for Israelis in East Jerusalem; in contrast, fewer than 600 units have been built for Palestinians in East Jerusalem, the last of which were built 40 years ago. So much for (Jerusalem Mayor Nir) Barkat’s claim ‘we build for everyone.’”

https://imemc.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/demolition-shufat2019school-MAAN.jpg

Oh oh, Israël accepte un plan de construction de milliers de logements pour les Palestiniens à Jérusalem Est. A suivre de près...

Israel okays plan for thousands of Palestinian homes in East Jerusalem - National - Israel News | Haaretz
▻http://www.haaretz.com/news/national/1.650035

The Jerusalem District Planning and Building Committee this week approved what will be the largest construction project of housing for Palestinian families in Jerusalem since 1967. The plan to build 2,500 housing units in Jabal Mukkaber in the southern part of East Jerusalem, was approved despite fierce opposition from right-wing politicians and organizations.

According to the plan’s architect, Senan Abdelkader, the opposition stalled the project for at least four years.

The plan to build 2,500 housing units as well as numerous playgrounds, parks and other public spaces near schools in Arab as-Sawahra, a neighborhood of Jabal Mukkaber, was approved years ago, and has won support from many officials within the Jerusalem Municipality. Mayor Nir Barkat, who tried to get the plan approved during his previous term as mayor, sees the step as an important means of improving the lives of East Jerusalem residents. Jabal Mukkaber borders the Jewish neighborhood of East Talpiot.

During an earlier stage of the approval process, Barkat said “planning in the neighborhoods in the Eastern part of the city by the municipality is a quintessential expression of Israeli sovereignty on all parts of the city, and strengthens a united Jerusalem. Without Jerusalem Municipality planning, a harsh, dangerous reality could arise in which individual planning projects would be approved by the courts, without any kind of systematic vision or consideration being given to the various issues facing the neighborhood in terms of building the public institutions lacking there.”

Barkat also noted that “the alternative to regulated planning is illegal construction of thousands of housing units and taking over large open spaces, which would harm the area as well as Israeli sovereignty over a unified Jerusalem.”

Members of various right-wing and settler organizations, however, worked against the plan and succeeded in causing significant delays. Former Interior Minister Eli Yishai refused to grant approval to the overall urban plan for Jerusalem due to right-wing claims that it allowed for construction of the Arab as-Sawahra neighborhood. In the end, neighborhood residents filed a petition with the courts that forced the authorities to reconsider and continue discussing the plan.

According to architect Abdelkader, the project is important not only because it will alleviate the housing crisis for the Arab population in East Jerusalem, but also because it will establish a precedent of cooperation among Palestinian landowners in advancing a large, joint construction project.

“I had doubts about accepting this project. I didn’t want to become a pawn for politicians, but the residents gave me a mandate. The public understood that it could act collectively in order to improve its situation,” said Abdelkader.

The hearing that took place on Monday in the district committee was attended by dozens of neighborhood residents who will be granted building permits as a result of the approval of the plan. The hearing was also attended by activists from various right-wing groups, as well as city councillor Aryeh King, who asked that the plan be postponed amid claims that it was advanced without sufficient research into the actual construction needs in East Jerusalem.

Despite the approval of the plan, it will be a long time until the neighborhood is built, as residents now need to organize into groups and submit detailed requests for building permits. The plan does allow, however, for relatively small groups of landowners to join forces for the approval of small-scale individual construction plans.

“The discussions revealed the extent to which opposition to the plan was political, as on one side there were the landowners, for whom the plan is like their last loaf of bread, and on the other side there were many powerful settler organizations,” read a statement released by the Ir Amim non-profit organization, which advocates for a more equitable distribution of land and resources in Jerusalem. The organization called on the planning authorities “to act with professional consideration and make decisions that lead to the most effective implementation of the plan.”

European companies complicit in new East Jerusalem project
▻http://www.alternativenews.org/english/index.php/activism/bds/591-european-companies-complicit-in-new-east-jerusalem-project

European companies are involved in the new Cable Car project in East Jerusalem. A joint project sponsored by the Israeli government and the Jerusalem Municipality aims to construct a cable car that will link West Jerusalem, the Old City, Mount of Olives near the Seven Arches Hotel and Gethsemane.

The Israeli municipality in Jerusalem recently hired the French company SAFEGE to do a feasibility study on the cable car that run from West to East Jerusalem. SAFAGE contracted with another French company, POMA, which specializes in cable cars.