Israel expands evictions of Palestinians in West Bank

In Silwan, south of the Al Aqsa Mosque, Kayed Rajabi and ‌his neighbours have been handed eviction orders in favour of an Israeli settler organisation which has already taken over parts of the Palestinian district. Rajabi’s home is surrounded by buildings that have raised large Israeli flags - a sign they are owned by settlers, who he said began buying homes in 2004, and have obtained about 40 buildings in Silwan now, many via forced evictions.
He said he was among 32 families in ‌the neighbourhood who have now been ordered to leave, with him and his brothers given until the end of Ramadhan - mid-March - to depart under an order from Israel’s Supreme Court. “They want to force me out of the house I was born ‌in, where my eyes first opened to life,” said Rajabi.
Daniel Luria, the executive director ‍of Ateret Cohanim, called Palestinians in Silwan “illegal squatters”, saying the land was owned by Jews before 1929 and that moving back was rectifying a historical injustice. Rajabi said that account was untrue. The Supreme Court did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Palestinians seek East Jerusalem, which Israel captured in a 1967 war, for a future state and say that leaving their homes there could put an end to their hopes forever.
Settler incursions, sometimes violent, have ramped up since the attack on Israel in October 2023 triggered the Gaza war. Palestinians in Gaza, shattered by two years of Israeli attacks in the enclave, have long faced restrictions on their movement and monitoring of their online activity and phone calls by Israeli surveillance agencies.
Nearly all of Gaza’s 2 million people have been forced into a narrow coastal strip from which Israeli forces withdrew under the ceasefire and where Hamas has retained control. Trump’s plan for Gaza, now in its second phase, calls for Gaza’s reconstruction to start in Rafah and for Hamas to lay down its arms in exchange for further Israeli troop withdrawals from the territory.
Silwan is particularly contentious due to its proximity to the ‍Al Aqsa ‌Mosque, a longtime flashpoint of Israeli-Palestinian tensions. Luria said that Ateret Cohanim had offered Silwan residents compensation for leaving. Numerous UN Security Council resolutions have called on Israel to halt all settlement activity, but successive Israeli governments have said settlements are critical to the country’s security.
If Palestinians refuse orders to leave, armed police go in to evict them and diggers demolish their homes. Rajabi ‍said that with the high prices for rent in Jerusalem, he does not know where he and his family will go. “People will live in the streets,” he said.