By Palestine Chronicle Staff
B’tselem, the Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories accused Israel of collectively punishing Palestinians in Jerusalem following a truck attack carried out by a Palestinian, in a press release published on January 11 2017.
The organization reported, “Israeli authorities have since adopted a series of punitive measures against al-Qunbar’s extended family and other local residents. Such measures constitute collective punishment targeting individuals who are not charged with any wrongdoing. There can be no possible justification for these vindictive steps.”
B’tselem added that some 40 demolition notices have been stuck on the houses of Palestinians in Jerusalem, many of them are relatives of the Palestinian attacker, telling them that the process of destroying their houses is ongoing.
Collective punishment in Jabal al-Mukabber: Jerusalem Municipality served some 40 demolition orders https://t.co/NhBvfmWh3n
— B'Tselem בצלם بتسيلم (@btselem) January 11, 2017
“The inspectors taped warning notices to the doors of some forty homes, stating that they were built without permits and that administrative proceedings to demolish them had been instigated. These structures all belong to the extended al-Qunbar family or are located near the home of the perpetrator of the ramming attack,” B’tselem continued.
In addition to the demolition orders, B’tselem revealed that dozens of Palestinians from the family of the attacker were arrested and will appear before the Immigration department later for their IDs to be revoked. “On Monday afternoon, several members of the extended al-Qunbar family were summoned to appear at a hearing on Wednesday at Israel’s Population and Immigration Authority prior to revocation of their status as Israeli residents,” B’tselem continued.
B’tselem concluded that “Imposing collective punishment in conjunction with adopting administrative measures against Palestinian nieghborhoods in East Jerusalem is an acknowledged Jerusalem Municipality policy…The measures being adopted now against the residents of Jabal al-Mukabber seem to be a further implementation of this discriminatory policy. While the policy is indeed an overt one, this does nothing to detract from it being a wrongful one which involves widespread persecution by the authorities of thousands of Jerusalem residents.”
(PalestineChronicle.com)
