{"id":209321,"date":"2007-06-28T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2019-03-12T19:44:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/?p=209321"},"modified":"2019-03-12T19:44:22","modified_gmt":"2019-03-12T19:44:22","slug":"auto-insert-209321","status":"publish","type":"document","link":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/document\/auto-insert-209321\/","title":{"rendered":"Refugees face prospect of new displacement – IRIN news article\/ Non-UN document"},"content":{"rendered":"
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ISRAEL-OPT: Some 600 villagers face prospect of new displacement <\/strong><\/span><\/p><\/div>\n

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\n<\/span>AL-WALAJE (WEST BANK), 28 June 2007 (IRIN) – Nearly all the Palestinian residents of al-Walaje village were displaced by the 1948 Israeli-Arab war or are descendants of those displaced, and many now again face the prospect of forced displacement, this time to make room for a possible new Israeli settlement and the construction of the Israeli West Bank separation barrier. <\/p>\n

About 600 people, all refugees registered with UNRWA, the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, live in the Ein Jwesia section of al-Walaje. Now, many of these Palestinians are concerned that they will lose their homes and land. <\/p>\n

"I have two demolition orders against my home," said Amin al-Atrash, from Ein Jwesia. <\/p>\n

"About 30 houses have already been destroyed in the village over the years," he added. <\/p>\n

As the residents are registered refugees, their case has been closely followed by UN agencies, although there is concern among aid workers that the efforts are "too little, too late".
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\nIsrael’s view <\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Shlomo Dror, from the Israeli minister of defence, said the houses are being demolished as they are illegal. "It's the law," he said. <\/span><\/p><\/div>\n

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I have two demolition orders against my home. About 30 houses have already been destroyed in the village over the years.<\/strong><\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n

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He was certain though that the villagers would be able to continue accessing their land. <\/p>\n

"They'll get permits," he said. "We always set up options for people who are disconnected from their land." <\/p>\n

The villagers, however, say they would rather be able to access their land without bureaucratic complications, and uncertainties about how the system will work in the future.
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\n“Grave concern” <\/strong><\/p>\n

"The situation of those living in Al-Walaje is of grave concern," said one UNRWA official who closely follows the village’s case. <\/p>\n

"These are 1948 refugees [those who left when the state of Israel was created]. They stand to lose everything all over again and to go through the trauma of yet another displacement if their homes are demolished," she [the official] added. <\/p>\n

The 1948 war divided the village in two, with half – the residential part, known now as "old Walaje" – falling under Israeli control. <\/p>\n

Some 600 residents fled the area, while about 1,000 people restarted their lives on their agricultural land nearby, which was then under Jordanian auspices. \n<\/p><\/div>\n

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"Everyone promised us we would be able to return to our village," said al-Atrash. "But we were never allowed to.” <\/p>\n

In 1967 Israel annexed half of the remaining parts of Walaje along with East Jerusalem, which it considers to be an inseparable part of the Jewish state. <\/p>\n

Since the people of Walaje hold West Bank ID cards, they are not allowed into Jerusalem without Israeli-issued permits. However, as significant parts of Walaje are inside municipal Jerusalem, the villagers face an absurd situation. <\/p>\n

"People have been arrested for being inside Jerusalem without the right permits, even when they were in their own homes," explained al-Atrash.
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\nDemolitions began in 1985 <\/strong><\/p>\n

Problems began for the residents in 1985, when Israeli authorities began to demolish homes. The problems further escalated in 2004, when plans to build a new Jewish settlement, as well as the barrier, on the parts of Walaje annexed into Jerusalem were announced. <\/p>\n

"Most of the agricultural land will be behind the wall and disconnected from the village," said Shawki Issa, a lawyer who helped fight land confiscation orders. <\/p>\n

"This village has no future like this, surrounded by settlements and walls," he said. <\/p>\n

The new settlement, Givat Yael, is planned to surround the village on three sides, while another settlement, already built, blocks it on the fourth side. <\/p>\n

"What this [new] settlement will do to their lives, it will choke them completely, ruin the peaceful existence of this village," said Meir Margolit, who was a member of the Jerusalem City Council, and now works with the residents on their housing rights. <\/p>\n

Al-Atrash says that already many young people are leaving the village because there simply are no places for them to live as open land for building is now very limited. <\/p>\n

shg\/ar\/cb <\/p><\/div>\n

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ISRAEL-OPT: Some 600 villagers face prospect of new displacement AL-WALAJE (WEST BANK), 28 June 2007 (IRIN) – Nearly all the Palestinian residents of al-Walaje village were displaced by the 1948 Israeli-Arab war or are descendants of those displaced, and many now again face the prospect of forced displacement, this time to make room for a […]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"country":[],"document-category":[2453],"document-source":[],"committee-meeting":[],"document-subject":[5400,2029,1745,1781,2137,2729,5399],"entity":[],"document-language":[6542],"class_list":["post-209321","document","type-document","status-publish","hentry","document-category-article","document-subject-fence","document-subject-house-demolitions","document-subject-refugees-and-displaced-persons","document-subject-separation-barrier","document-subject-settlements","document-subject-shelter","document-subject-wall","document-language-english"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document\/209321","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/document"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document\/209321\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=209321"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"country","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/country?post=209321"},{"taxonomy":"document-category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document-category?post=209321"},{"taxonomy":"document-source","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document-source?post=209321"},{"taxonomy":"committee-meeting","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/committee-meeting?post=209321"},{"taxonomy":"document-subject","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document-subject?post=209321"},{"taxonomy":"entity","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/entity?post=209321"},{"taxonomy":"document-language","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.un.org\/unispal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/document-language?post=209321"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}