OCCUPIED JERUSALEM,(Palestine Foundation Information Center) Israeli occupation police forces on Thursday compelled a Palestinian citizen to demolish his own home in the Wadi Hilweh neighborhood of Silwan, located south of Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem.
According to the Jerusalem District Governorate, the occupation authorities forced Jerusalemite Iyad Qara’in to carry out the demolition himself, under threat of financial penalties if the occupation municipality were to undertake the demolition.
This practice is part of a broader policy systematically enforced by Israeli authorities in occupied Jerusalem, where Palestinians are often denied building permits and then ordered to destroy their homes under the pretext of “unauthorized construction.” Refusal to do so results in hefty fines and the municipality carrying out the demolition at the owner’s expense.
Rights groups and Palestinian officials have long condemned these forced self-demolitions as a means of ethnic cleansing, aimed at displacing Palestinians from Jerusalem to make way for expanding illegal Israeli settlements.
The Wadi Hilweh neighborhood, like much of Silwan, is regularly targeted by demolition orders, harassment, and settler incursions. These measures are part of the occupation’s broader plan to alter the demographic character of the city and tighten its control over Palestinian areas surrounding Al-Aqsa Mosque.
