Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat is expected to announce that he is halting 70% of the planned demolitions of illegal homes in the Arab areas of the capital. In addition, the city will negotiate compensatory packages to the families compelled to move out of the remaining 30% of the homes, the daily Haaretz reports.
Haaretz states that estimates indicate there are some 20,000 illegal structures, home to some 180,000 people.
Interestingly, the statement represents a change in policy since in March; the mayor went head-to-head with US Secretary of State Clinton, who spoke out harshly against the planned demolition of illegal [Arab] homes in the capital, involving herself in domestic issues.
City Hall is reportedly working on expanded building projects in the predominately Arab eastern areas of the capital.
(Yechiel Spira – YWN Israel)
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Knocking down people’s houses for political reasons is common in Israel (hardly limited to Arabs, nor to fanatical religious zionists in Gaza and the West Bank). It is a dumb “minhag” the zionists inherited from the Brits, who frequently used it within the Empire as a way to keep people in line (the policy’s success can be measured by the changes in size of the British Empire over the last 100 years).