The Israeli Occupation of Jerusalem

During the 1948 war, the Israeli army occupied almost 66% of Jerusalem. The old city and its eastern parts remained in the hands of the Palestinians . Following the 1967 war, Israel occupied the remaining parts of the city and annexing it unilaterally, in complete defiance to international law and declared that the city is the “eternal undivided capital of Israel” .

The Israeli Knesset (parliament) endoresed, on 27 June 1967, the annexation of East Jerusalem to Israel to becom since that time, part of Israel by virtue of order no. 2064.
Following this unilateral and illegal decision, consecutive Israeli governments stepped up measures to juadize the city in an attempt to obliterate the Arabic and Islamic features of Jerusalem .
This has been initiated through the expropreation of 116 dunums of the properties of the Muslim Waqf (Religious Affairs), or about 10% of the total area of the old city, to build modern flats for Jewish settlers. Israel has transferred many public departments including ministries to these new building and went on juadizing education to cope with its expansionest and racist policy. It has also isolated east Jerusalem from the rest of the Palestinian cities in the West Bank through the closure of its main entrances and prohibited Palestinian Muslim and Christian Worshippers from entering the city .

Among its arbitrary measures, Israel sent its archeological teams to excavate arround and below Al-Aqsa Mosque which has caused great damage to the historic buildings.
The Israeli government has desecrated the Islamic holy places, attached Muslim worshippers several times, and set on fire Al-Aqsa Mosque on 21 August 1968. The burning of the Mosque and the Israeli attempt to blow it up in 1980 were not the last in its disgraceful acts, but it has also desecrated the holy tombs inside the Church of the Holy Sepulchre and looted many churches .
Moreover, Israel has demolished hunderds of Palestinian houses, banned the expansion or building by its Palestinian native residents inside the city, uprooted by force its native, and built a belt of Jewish settlements around it, in its quest to judaize the city. The settlements were built over land expropriated from the Palestinians under the force of arms and through means of intimidation .
Israel has also levied exorbitant taxes against Jerusalem resident like the “Arnona tax”, and at the same time depriving them from any services.

This aggressive policy did not stop, but went beyond this point, when Israel decided to establish “Greater Jerusalem” through occupying more Palestinian land to itsmunicipal border of Jerusalem estimated about 30% of the total area of the West Bank. The exropriated land extends from Ramallah and Al Bireh cities in the north, Abu Deis, Aizzarye, and Al Tur in the east, to Latroun in the west and to Bethlehem, Beit Jala and Sur Baher in the south.