JERUSALEM, Monday, September 23, 2019 (WAFA) - The Israeli Magistrate Court ruled today to evict a Palestinian Jerusalemite family from its home in the East Jerusalem neighbourhood of Wadi Hilweh in Silwan for the benefit of settlers, said local sources.

Sources told WAFA the court ruling came in favor of the settler organizations of Ateret Cohanim and Elad, which filed a lawsuit demanding that the house be evicted under the pretext that it was absentee property.

Ateret Cohanim and Elad organizations are settler groups that aim to create a Jewish majority in East Jerusalem at the expense of Palestinians.

According to the Israeli anti-settlement group, Peace Now, “Over the years, Israel has used a number of legal and bureaucratic procedures in order to appropriate West Bank lands, with the primary objective of establishing settlements and providing land reserves for them.”

“Using primarily these five methods: seizure for military purposes; declaration of state lands; seizure of absentee property; confiscation for public needs; and initial registration, Israel has managed to take over 50% of the lands in the West Bank, barring the local Palestinian public from using them.”

T.R.