JERUSALEM, Tuesday, June 18, 2019 (WAFA) – The Mufti of Jerusalem Sheikh Muhammad Hussein slammed the Israeli occupation authorities’ decision to demolish 16 Palestinian residential buildings in an occupied Jerusalem neighborhood as ethnic cleansing.

Sheikh Muhammad Hussein, who is the highest Muslim religious cleric in Palestine, slammed the Israeli High Court’s decision to demolish 16 residential buildings in the Wadi Hummus neighborhood, located on the edge of Sur Baher, in the southeast of Jerusalem, as “heinous practice of racist ethnic cleansing” against the Palestinian people. 

Hussein warned that the Israeli court’s approval of the demolition of the buildings, composed of some 100 apartments, under flimsy pretenses would result in the displacement of scores of Palestinian families with the purpose of Judaization of Jerusalem.

He cautioned against the recent display of an image depicting Al-Aqsa Mosque compound without the Dome of the Rock at an event attended by Israeli Premier Benjamin Netanyahu.

He also condemned the distribution of Israeli orders to evict Palestinian families from their homes and uproot trees in the Jerusalem neighborhood of al-Issawiya to make room for the construction of a park.

Meanwhile, the Israeli West Jerusalem municipality demolished today a two-story building that was under construction in Shufat refugee camp, east of Jerusalem, and a shop for building material in Jabal al-Mukabber neighborhood under the pretext of construction without permit.

Israeli forces have sharply escalated the demolitions of Palestinian property in East Jerusalem, recently prompting the United Nations (UN) to decry the alarming trend and call on Israel to immediately halt the destruction of Palestinian property.

K.F./M.K.