Land Research Center

On February 13, 2022, the house owners, Malik Majid Dabash and Alaa Khader Al-Karaki, were forced to demolish their two-floors house, on the grounds that they did not have a building permit (a license) in the Quisan neighborhood in Sur Baher, south of occupied Jerusalem. They have self-demolished the house, in order to avoid a huge violation fine of 250 thousand shekels, equivalent to 80 thousand US dollars.

As usual, the Jerusalem municipality’s policy, gave the residents of the house about two weeks to implement the decision. Thus, on the tenth day, the owners proceeded to demolish the house, which consists of two apartments, each with an area of 140 square meters, built on two floors since 2015, at a construction cost of about one million shekels, equivalent to 350 thousand US dollars. As the house was inhabited by those two families, they had to demolish using bulldozers to complete the process before it was too late for them.

Members of the Dabash and Al- Karaki families lives the house in its two apartments. The Dabash family consists of five members, and the Al-Karaki family consists of seven members, knowing that nine of them are children in schools.

The owners of the house stated that, in addition to construction expenses, huge sums were paid to the municipality as violations and wages for lawyers and courts, amounting to about half a million shekels, or the value of 160,000 US dollars, which caused great suffering to the two afflicted families, in addition to the dispersal of those families, they became without a home to shelter them, as Malik Dabash said (our bed is the earth, and our cover is the sky) and he expressed the accompanying psychological difficulties and problems, as the wife of one of them cannot sleep because of anxiety, and in addition to the absence of their children from school and the distraction of their thoughts and mental stability. The owner Dabash appealed for immediate assistance, and aid, adding that (helping to mitigate the damage is a national and humanitarian duty).

It is noteworthy that the village of Sur Baher is one of the Palestinian villages located to the southeast of the city of Jerusalem, on the northern borders of the city of Bethlehem. It is bordered by the villages of Abu al-Hummus, Um Tuba and Mukaber, while the settlement of Har Homa (Abu Ghneim) borders it from the south, and the American street crosses it from the east. In addition to the many ongoing demolitions that turned the Quysan neighborhood into a scene of destruction and ruins, the town’s lands are threatened by many Judaization projects aimed at tightening the screws on the residents and forcing many of them to leave the place and emigrate.