Jerusalem's Christians face ethnically motivated home destruction, claims Church

New house demolition orders were issued against several Christian Palestinian families living in the Old City of Jerusalem, according to the Jerusalem Inter-Church Centre this June.

Jerusalem's Greek Orthodox Patriarchate and Catholic Franciscan Custody of the Holy Land (Custodia Terra Sancta) accommodate over 500 Palestinian families in homes in the Old City. Christian homes and churches have for some time, according to the Inter-Church Centre, been facing difficulty in obtaining permits for renovation from the Israeli authorities in Jerusalem.

The four families threatened with eviction say they have been contacted individually by the Israeli municipal authorities in Jerusalem and have already had court procedures instituted against them.

One resident, Sami Wakileh, has described the initial court procedures, saying that he has been told by the judge that any defense against the eviction orders is “a waste of your precious time. Do not dream of receiving any permit…” Mr Wakileh has stated that he has spent over US$100,000 renovating the home he leases from the Church.

In May 2009, ten more Christian families in the North East Jerusalem suburb of Beit Hanina also received demolition orders for their apartments, which were built six years ago. The orders claim that although half of the Sunbula building, where the apartments are situated, is legal, the other half was never given planning permission and will be knocked down.

Members of the Palestinian Christian community have strongly criticised the Israeli municipality's demolition orders, saying that Israeli settlers have freely received building permits in areas where Arab families are routinely denied permission to build or extend houses.

Father Ibrahim Faltas, the Roman Catholic parish priest for Jerusalem, has stated that Catholic marriages in Jerusalem have been cut by half. Israeli residency rules mean that Palestinian residents of Jerusalem who marry Christians from West Bank towns such as Bethlehem lose their permits and have no option but the leave Jerusalem to live abroad or in the West Bank, and in the cases of existing married couples there are cases of children being separated by their parents by residency rules.

Although the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is often characterised as one between Muslims and Jews, George Rishmawi of the Siraj Centre for Holy Land Studies, based in Bethlehem, insists that Palestinian Christians are an integral part of the Palestinian population, representing up to 20% of the nationality. Christians members of Palestinian society often find it easier to emigrate because of their high levels of education and international contacts. But, claims Rishmawi, this fact is played upon by the Israeli authorities in their conflict with Palestine:

“Palestinian Christians today are suffering just the same as any other Palestinians,” says Rishmawi. “Israel has been claiming all the time that this is a Jewish-Muslim conflict not an Arab-Israeli conflict. So they need the Palestinian Christians out, and this is definitely one of the reasons why the Bethlehem area is very highly targeted by Israel. So today, the Bethlehem area is surrounded by this apartheid wall that Israel has built, confiscating thousands of acres of Christian-owned land and making the city suffocate.”

Sarah Irving is a freelance writer specialising in social and environmental issues.