Clinton's got my back!

Clinton condemns Israel's demolition of Arab East Jerusalem homes

Move was a violation of international obligations, US secretary of state says at press call with Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas

• Rory McCarthy in Jerusalem
• guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 4 March 2009 14.12 GMT
• Article history

Clinton voices concern over Israeli demolition plans Link to this video

Hillary Clinton criticised Israel's plans to demolish dozens of homes in Arab East Jerusalem today, during a joint news conference with the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas.

The US secretary of state said the move was a violation of Israel's international obligations, and the US would raise the matter with the country's leaders.

"Clearly this kind of activity is unhelpful and not in keeping with the obligations entered into under the 'road map'," she said, referring to the long-stalled peace plan. "It is an issue that we intend to raise with the government of Israel and the government at the municipal level in Jerusalem."

Clinton made the comments during her first trip to the Palestinian territories in her new role.In Jerusalem yesterday, she said the creation of an independent Palestinian state was now "inescapable".

However, Palestinian leaders say the continued expansion of Jewish settlements across East Jerusalem and the West Bank make it increasingly difficult for that state to be established.

"The main point is that the Israeli government needs to accept the two-state solution and ... stop settlement expansion," Saeb Erekat, the chief Palestinian negotiator, said.

Although Abbas has held peace talks with Israeli leaders since late 2007, he has little to show for it.

On Monday, the Israeli group Peace Now reported that the Israeli housing ministry was planning to build at least 73,000 housing units in West Bank settlements.

The organisation said 15,000 units had already been approved and another 58,000 were awaiting approval.

Almost 500,000 settlers now live in east Jerusalem and the West Bank. All settlements are illegal under international law.

The Palestinians will ask Clinton to put pressure on Israel to open its crossings into Gaza to allow in materials for rebuilding after the recent offensive.

"We want the US to help us open the passages to get material for reconstruction into Gaza," Erekat said.

Reports in the Israeli press today said that, in a meeting yesterday, Clinton had pressed the Israeli defence minister, Ehud Barak, to allow more aid into Gaza.

Clinton said the US would send two senior officials to Syria for "preliminary conversations", an apparent sign of a new softening of US policy.

US officials said Jeffrey Feltman, the state department's leading Middle East diplomat, would travel to Damascus along with Dan Shapiro, of the White House's national security council.

Last week, Feltman held talks lasting for almost two hours with the Syrian ambassador to Washington – the highest-level contact between the countries since the start of the Obama government.

Washington recalled its ambassador to Damascus in 2005 after the assassination of the former Lebanese prime minister Rafiq al-Hariri in Beirut.

Obama's administration has been reviewing its policy towards Syria and is considering whether to send an ambassador again.

At a conference to raise aid for the Palestinians, held in Egypt on Monday, Clinton shook hands and spoke briefly with the Syrian foreign minister, Walid al-Moallem.

Clinton's announcement came after she met the Israeli foreign minister, Tzipi Livni. She also met the Israeli president, Shimon Peres, the opposition leader and probable next prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, and the current prime minister, Ehud Olmert.

Clinton has said she wants to pursue peace between Israel and the Arab world on "many fronts", suggesting she might encourage Israel and Syria to talk.

Some Israeli figures believe an agreement with Syria may be easier to achieve than a peace deal with the Palestinians.

However, Netanyahu has appeared to rule out negotiations with Syria by refusing to give up the Golan Heights, which Israel captured in 1967.

Netanyahu – who is likely to lead a narrow, rightwing government – has also stopped short of endorsing a two-state solution to end the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians, which may put his government at odds with the US administration.

Clinton said a two-state deal was in "Israel's best interests".

"The United States will be vigorously engaged in the pursuit of a two-state solution every step of the way," she said. "The inevitability of working toward a two-state solution is inescapable."

the demolitions begin.

I'm in the office today working on a grant to the EU.

However, we just got a call saying that a home in Silwan was just demolished, and several more are scheduled for today and tomorrow. The government is finally acting on its plans to demolish 88 homes in the neighborhood of Silwan. This comes just a week after the government issued a statement saying that there were no 'immediate plans' to demolish homes in this area.

These homes are part of the group of homes I have been profiling as part of my internship. Though the families I know personally have not yet been affected, I fear for the near future.

My heart aches for the families who are losing homes on this cold and rainy day.

Some background on the Silwan demolitions:
Christian Science Monitor
Washington Times

Silwan Profile 2: Family of 43

A large part of my internship at Rabbis for Human Rights has become creating home profiles for homes that are under demolition order. My second day of home profiling in Silwan took me to the home of the Abu-Naj family. This family's story is a tough one. They have 43 people living in their house. (This includes two brothers, a sister and all of their children and grandchildren). Their family moved into the house after the 1948 war, when they were forced to leave their former homes in West Jerusalem. Since then they have been paying rent to a man who recently died. Upon his death, a Jewish* settler family claimed the house as being theirs (from before the 1948 conflict I suppose). They refuse to take rent payments or offers to buy the house from the Palestinian family and demand that they leave the house. To further complicate matters, because of their large and growing family, the Abu-Naj's have added on several rooms to the original structure of the house. After the settler family made a claim on the house, the government issued a demolition order on the parts of the house that were not part of the original structure, saying that it was built without a building permit (Arabs are essentially NEVER given building permits by the government to build in Jerusalem, so almost all houses are built without permits - in fact, pretty much the entire neighborhood of Silwan is under demolition order because of this). And to even FURTHER complicate matters, the settler family that is claiming the house says that the house itself has some sort of religious significance and therefore has even more reason to not be a home to this family. Eek.

Here is the head of the household with two of his grandchildren. He painted the room himself and says that he likes to go there to pray and be alone (with 43 people in the house this is a rare space).

This is Fakhri, a community leader and my contact/translator in Silwan. He picks me and the other volunteers up at the entrance of the neighborhood and walks with us to the homes that we are profiling. (Thank goodness or I would probably STILL be wandering around lost). Unfortunately, his home is also under demolition order. It is in his home that I participated in my first interview and profile.
Each interview cannot start without 2 or 3 wonderful cups of mint tea (with lots of sugar) and cannot continue without a VERY THICK cup of coffee (complete with a pile of grounds at the bottom of each cup). I have never, ever liked coffee, but I have learned to breathe deeply and get enough of it down (after pouring in about 4 spoonfuls of sugar) to be polite. I learned that drinking it quickly is a big mistake as then I am just given another cup. Slow sipping is key. Needless to say, each interview ends with me on a sugar and caffiene high.

This interview was hard, as I could tell right away that they would have a very tough case and if everything continues at the status quo, will lose their house. It is hard to sit and get to know these people and experience their hospitality and see their love for their home and family and realize that in a week or less, their home may be rubble and they will either be forced to crowd in with neighbors or be on the street. That said, at the end of this interview, I got a special treat because two of the grandchildren who live in the home peeked in the door to visit. They are beautiful and animated children who were especially excited about seeing their images on my camera. I look at these pictures and hope.. I don't even know for what exactly. For peace? For them to learn to forgive and coexist despite what has happened in their pasts and present? For them to value and to be valued as humans instead of by ethnicity, religion or race? For them to be blessed with extra heapings of resilience and optimism?



*Note: This does not mean that all Jews in Jerusalem do the things or believe in the things that this particular settler family is doing. In fact, the vast, vast majority would not. Even further, there are many Jews in Jerusalem (including my organization Rabbis for Human Rights and most of my Jewish friends and people I interact with daily) who outright condemn that this is happening. This has nothing to do with Jews vs. non-Jews, or even Israelis vs. non-Israelis. It is an extremist attitude that unfortunately a few powerful people and families have adopted, and even more unfortunately, that the government has not stopped. One of the most shocking things that I have learned is that many (if not most) people (even in Jerusalem) do not know that this is happening, or if they do know, they do not know the extent of it or its affect on the individuals, families and communities.

Heading to Jordan!

Lots happening: two of my home demolition cases have gone to court this week, taught the Bedouin teachers on Tuesday, I was detained briefly at a border with a friend on Sunday, stuck for a few minutes in the cavernous checkpoint at Bethlehem on Tuesday, gave a presentation to the Rotary club of Jerusalem, taught rabbis about blogs :), got to see the church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, went to the Galilee and Nazareth last weekend..... so many stories to tell... but it will have to wait, because I am packing up to spend the weekend in Petra, Jordan.

I am loving my time here so much, and learning more than I thought possible.


PS - On the alert: government sent out a notice that homes in Silwan will be demolished in the next 48 hours (please no), my heart aches.

Silwan

This is Silwan, and Arab neighborhood in East Jerusalem (PS - totally check out the link, it has a very interesting history). Today, I went with two other volunteers to interview a family whose home is under demolition order by the government.

I"ll hopefully have the patience to write out a bit of the issues with home demolitions in the future, because it is incredibly important and incredibly complicated - but for now, check out the link above if you are interested.

Outside the home of the family that we interviewed - this house has a demolition order against it.



Conducting interviews. Mainly, we ask questions just to try to understand their side of the story - what were they told by the authorities, what is the story behind the home and property, do they have legal representation, what will they do if it is demolished, how many people live there, etc.




What we want to not happen: The remains of a home that was demolished a couple of months ago. In this case, there was not very much time to get everything out, so there is all sorts of stuff in the rubble - shoes, furniture, etc.