[News] 'We must stand together': Sheikh Jarrah residents promise to stand firm after Salhiya demolition

[Anti-Imperialist News]

middleeasteye.net
<https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/israel-palestine-jerusalem-sheikh-jarrah-residents-stand-firm>
'We
must stand together': Sheikh Jarrah residents promise to stand firm after
Salhiya demolition
By Latifeh Abdellatif in Jerusalem - January 22, 2022
------------------------------

Waiting for news about her detained son and grandchildren, Majda Salhiya
looked undeterred by the violent Israeli raid on her home in the East
Jerusalem neighbourhood of Sheikh Jarrah
<https://www.middleeasteye.net/topics/sheikh-jarrah> a day earlier
<https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/sheikh-jarrah-israeli-forces-raid-neighbourhood-overnight-demolish-salhiya-house>
.

Memories of the raid and the demolition that followed were hazy to the
75-year-old, who suffers from Alzheimer's disease. But when asked about how
she felt, her tone was assured and defiant.

“They can detain and threaten us but we will not surrender our land,” Umm
Mahmoud, as she is known in the family, told Middle East Eye. “If we have
to die, we will not surrender.”

<https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/israel-sheikh-jarrah-demolition-widely-condemned>

'War crime': Israel widely condemned for Sheikh Jarrah demolition

Read More »
<https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/israel-sheikh-jarrah-demolition-widely-condemned>

The family of 18 were made homeless on Wednesday after Israeli
<https://www.middleeasteye.net/countries/israel> forces removed them from
their house in an overnight raid before razing it to the ground.

Mahmoud Salhiya, the patriarch of the house, was assaulted and arrested
with five others. After spending the night in detention, all of those
arrested were released conditionally and handed bans from entering Sheikh
Jarrah for 30 days.

Holding back the tears and speaking with a breaking voice, Mahmoud looked
exhausted when he addressed the press upon his release.

“They assaulted me, I died. I honestly died,” Mahmoud said about the
conditions of his arrest and detention.

He told local media that Israeli officers went out of their way to
humiliate him, holding guns to his and his relatives' heads while making
the arrests and deliberately forcing him out of the house barefoot.

“The manner in which they raided the house was done for revenge,” he said.
“This is a government of settlers. They have no honour, no morals.”

When Mahmoud was taken to court, officers took him to see how his home had
been flattened, he added. “When I saw it like that, I died,” he said. “They
destroyed the house but we will build it again. They will not be here for
long.”
Palestinian solidarity

Despite the pain felt by the Salhiyas after the demolition, the support and
solidarity they received gave them some respite.

A doctor from the Sbaitan family in Jerusalem gave the keys to his house to
the family after they were made homeless, a gesture of goodwill, Mahmoud
said, that is typical of the people of Jerusalem.

Since Israeli authorities first attempted
<https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/sheikh-jarrah-israel-forces-evict-palestinian-family-jerusalem>
to expel the Salhiyas from their home on Monday, dozens of activists had
gathered at the property to protect it against any raids and livestream it
for the world to see.

  In the cold weather, young men and women set up campfires on the
Salhiyas’ land, singing and chanting patriotic songs.

'This is a cause that unites us all, protecting Sheikh Jarrah and Palestine'

- *Seif al-Qawasmi, Palestinian activist *

Seif al-Qawasmi, a Jerusalem activist among those who stayed on the
property for two days before the demolition, said he was there because an
attack on one house in the city is an attack on everybody.

“We all sat around the fire despite our differences. This is a cause that
unites us all, protecting Sheikh Jarrah and Palestine,” Qawasmi told MEE.

"The two nights before the demolition were evidence of the importance of
popular presence and social solidarity.”

While the demolition felt like one battle lost for Palestinians, Qawasmi
said, the resilience and steadfastness that Mahmoud has shown since Monday
has been a source of inspiration that will not be forgotten.

"What Mahmoud did was brave,” he said. “It’s something that will be
remembered by future generations.”
'Must stand together'

The Salhiya home was demolished and the family expelled under the pretext
of building a school on the land, which the Israeli municipality claims
ownership of.

The land was confiscated by Israel after it captured the city in 1967,
according to the Absentees' Property Law
<https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/israel-palestinian-absentees-property-law-eviction-homes-explained>
.

<https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/israel-jerusalem-sheikh-jarrah-what-next-after-palestinians-reject-court-deal>

Sheikh Jarrah: Can a new 'popular solidarity' save the neighbourhood from
evictions?

At present, 37 Palestinian families live in Sheikh Jarrah, six of them
facing imminent eviction.

Since 2020, Israeli courts have ordered the eviction of 13 Palestinian
families in the neighbourhood, which has become a significant flashpoint
over the past year, after Israel tried to expel Palestinian families from
the area last May to make way for Israeli settlers.

This prompted widespread protests across the occupied West Bank and
among Palestinian
citizens of Israel
<https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/israel-palestinian-citizens-who-explained>,
as well as a large-scale military operation in the besieged Gaza Strip.

Ramzy Abbas, a local activist, said the widespread solidarity in May put
pressure on Israel to postpone the evictions but people had to stay alert
until the court orders are completely reversed.

"We have succeeded in the past [in stopping evictions] by standing
together. We must stand together now,” Abbas told MEE.

“Yesterday it was Salhiyas’ house, it could be my home or yours tomorrow."

*Additional reporting by Chaymaa Mohamed.*
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