Land Research Center

Tuesday December 24^th 2019, the Israeli Occupation bulldozers demolished a residential building in Al-Isawiya , on the pretext of building without licenses.

The targeted building belongs to Jameel ‘Eleyan. Reportedly, it consists of three floors with a total area of 600 m², the first floor contains three stores, the second and the third floors are residential apartments , each floor has an area of 200 m².

Owner Jameel ‘Eleyan told LRC:

“In 2017 , the occupation bulldozers demolished my 4 floors building at the same location on the pretext of building without licenses , after the demolition I constructed the building all over, I tried to get a license from the occupation , but as always they refused.

Consequently, I had to build without a license to make a home for my family, but during the construction phase the occupation authorities showed up and gave me a demolition order.

Several court sessions were conducted for this case, the latest was last October at the central court which gave me an order to demolish my own structure, but I refused to carry out the demolition.

Tuesday, Occupation forces and municipality employees showed up accompanied by bulldozers, surrounded the building and prohibited people from approaching the location before they leveled the structure to the ground.”.

It is worthy mentioning that the occupation authorities are increasing their repressive procedures against Al'Isaweya people, they decree tens of demolition orders against houses and firms , in addition to installing check points on the towns entrances, and filing fines against derivers, other than decreeing taxes, daily breaking into towns and assault citizens and their properties. Moreover, they arrest citizens, especially children, there are number of children who are home arrests or administrative detainees or have to pay expensive fines. Nevertheless, they turned numbers of them to work in Israeli institution as a punishment.

Al'Isawiya: [1]

7 kilometer north Jerusalem, Al'Isawiya is surrounded by Shu'fat and 'Anata (North), Jerusalem and Shu'fat (west), Al' Eizariya (east) , Jerusalem and Az Za'ayyem (north) .

Al'Isawiya has a total area of 9,419 of which 673 dunums are a built-up area of the village.

The Israeli occupation devoured 2305 dunums of the lands of the village, for the following purposes:

The occupation devoured 1019 dunums for colonies:

bypass number (1) and number (437) took over 641.5 dunums of the village lands.

The Apartheid Wall that damaged 44 dunums and is 443 long.

Occupation's military camps took over 600 dunums.

Legal feedback:

The doings of the occupation's authorities of demolishing Palestinian homes and buildings is a serious violation of international and humanitarian law. And violate the rights of Palestinian citizens as ensured by international law and international conventions which is the right of an appropriate residence . According to the following articles:

• Article 147 of Geneva fourth convention : extensive destruction and appropriation of property, not justified by military necessity and carried out unlawfully and wantonly. ( it is considered a serious violation of the convention)
• Article 53 of Geneva fourth convention that forbids destroying properties : Any destruction by the Occupying Power of real or personal property belonging individually or collectively to private persons, or to the State, or to other public authorities, or to social or co-operative organizations, is prohibited, except where such destruction is rendered absolutely necessary by military operations.
• Article 33 of Geneva fourth convention: No protected person may be punished for an offence he or she has not personally committed.
• Article 32 of Hague convention 1907 part g: To destroy or seize the enemy's property, unless such destruction or seizure be imperatively demanded by the necessities of war.
• Article 17 of Universal declaration of human rights 10 –Dec- 1948: No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his property.

[1] GIS-LRC