JERUSALEM, Monday, June 12, 2023 (WAFA) – Israel’s forced displacement of Palestinians in occupied East Jerusalem amounts to a war crime and demands urgent intervention from the international community, today said the Palestinian Authority’s (PA) Ministry of Jerusalem Affairs.
It said in a statement that the imminent forcible eviction of the Sub Laban family from its home in Aqbat al-Khalidiya in Jerusalem’s Old City amounts to a war crime in which the occupation authorities, at its various levels, including the judicial and the Israeli settlement groups, are involved.
“The occupation’s decision to evict the elderly couple, Nora Ghaith-Sub Laban, 68, and her husband, Mustafa Sub Laban, 72, from the house in which the family has resided since 1953 after provocations, harassment and assaults that lasted for 45 years is tantamount to forced displacement prohibited by international law," said the ministry.
“The grave eviction decision comes in the context of attempts by the occupation and settler groups to seize the largest number of Palestinian homes in the Old City and nearby Silwan, specifically in the vicinity of Al-Aqsa Mosque, for well-known objectives."
The Ministry of Jerusalem Affairs also warned that the eviction of the Sub Laban family from its home is part of a larger scheme aimed at evicting dozens of other Palestinian families in the Old City, Silwan and Sheikh Jarrah neighborhoods of occupied East Jerusalem from their homes in favor of colonial settler groups.
"The forced displacement decision aims to deport the Palestinians in the context of the apartheid system applied on the ground by the occupation authorities," it said, calling for immediate and decisive action to stop all forced evictions, home demolitions, settlement activity, attempts to divide Al-Aqsa Mosque and attacks on holy sites.
"We followed with interest and appreciated the solidarity visits made by diplomats to the home of the Sub Laban family and the statements of condemnation of the occupation's practices, but the time has come to turn these statements into a political act that obliges the occupation to stop its countless crimes in the occupied city," the ministry concluded its statement.
M.K.
