Updated Jan. 9, 2024 at 10:00 p.m.
JERUSALEM — Amal Marar, a Jerusalem-based journalist, used to describe daily life in the holy city as “a battle,” as longstanding intimidation attempts by the Israeli military of Arabs in Jerusalem have been met in recent years with greater resistance.
Since the start of the war in Gaza, that dynamic has taken a dark and dangerous new turn. The Israeli army has imposed more restrictions and treated ethnic Arab Jerusalem residents with unprecedented ferocity and barbarism, while the city is experiencing an existential war in the literal sense.
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Marar, a journalist who has been working in the field for many years, said that since Oct 7, the Israeli army has been given a green light by the government to target Palestinian residents in Jerusalem. And journalists are no exception.
“Today, the journalist is alone in the field, and it is easy for him to be attacked just for doing his job. There are many TV channels that have been banned from working and broadcasting in the city,” she said. “Field journalistic work has become dangerous and unsafe, and all forms of journalistic work are targeted. The rules of the field have changed now. There is no safe place to report from.”
Marar said protective vests have become a permanent garment for Jerusalemite journalists. “Even if there are no confrontations, the journalist is monitored in all his movements,” she said. “The aim is to block the Palestinian narrative from the world and singling out the city of Jerusalem.”
And of course, the crackdown on journalists is just one of the more visible elements of a concerted effort to make life for Palestinian in Jerusalem unlivable, which can eventually reach the point of purging them from the city that is their home.
A big prison
Israel captured East Jerusalem in the 1967 Middle East war and the entire city has since been under its rule. Palestinians demand that the eastern half of the city, which houses Al-Aqsa Mosque, becomes the capital of their future state. Israel, meanwhile, insists on holding on to the whole city as its capital, and has called on foreign countries to move their embassies to Israel there.
Hijazi Al-Rishq, who heads the Palestinian Industrial Chamber of Commerce of Jerusalem, said the economic situation in the city has deteriorated since Oct. 7 to its lowest point the city since 1967.
Raids on homes and stores have reached unprecedented levels.
He said Jerusalem has turned into a big prison for its Palestinian residents, especially the Old City which has become “a prison with seven doors,” where no one, but its residents, is allowed in. That has been compounded by repeated raids on homes and stores that have reached unprecedented levels.
Tourism and commercial sectors have been hit hardest, with many workers furloughed. About 1,372 shops have been closed in the Old City, including 462 shops dedicated to selling oriental antiques, because of the dwindling numbers of tourists arriving in the city.
A reported 91% of commercial sectors in the city have had zero monthly income since the start of the war.
“Imports have been completely stopped,” he said, “so large numbers of workers have been laid off.”
“Loyalty to Israel” law
Ziad Al-Hammouri, director of the Jerusalem Center for Social and Economic Rights, said the city has effectively been at war since 1967, and that Israel’s ultimate aim is to empty the city of all its Palestinian residents. He said it’s a different form of the same attempts of purging Gaza now with a broader aim of liquidating the Palestinians cause altogether.
“It’s other tools in Jerusalem and the West Bank to achieve the same goal,” he said.
Al-Hammouri said Israel has taken a series of measures to empty the city, including the adaptation of laws that have made the life of Palestinians there very difficult. He cited the law of “Loyalty to Israel,” which allows revoking the residency of any Jerusalemite who lives outside the borders of the Jerusalem municipality.
The law essentially aims to turn the demographic equation in favor of the Israeli presence inside East Jerusalem, which is supposed to be the capital of the Palestinian state according to the Oslo Accords.
He said Palestinians currently constitute 40% of Jerusalem’s population, while Israeli authorities’ objective is to reduce them to only 8%.
Judiazation of Jerusalem
“The Judaization of the Palestinian land has been completed, and this can be seen through the major changes that have occurred in the city and the severing of areas from each other through daily programs implemented against Jerusalemites,” Al-Hammouri said. “Only a fraction of people are allowed to enter the Old City and reach Al-Aqsa Mosque.”
Israel has exploited the war in Gaza.
He said Israel has exploited the war in Gaza and the emergency law to double detention campaigns in Jerusalem even for “writing on social media” under the pretext of incitement. He also referred to Israel’s policy of demolishing houses of Palestinians.
The Palestinian Governorate in Jerusalem said in a statement that it documented the killing of 29 Palestinians in Jerusalem in October and November. There were also 680 detentions, including several dozen women and children, 19 demolition operations along with repeating storming of the courtyards of the Al-Aqsa Mosque in October, the statement said.
