LEGALIZING A JEWISH APARTMENT IN AN ARAB NEIGHBORHOOD

The interior minister has confirmed he'll be working to legalize a Jewish-owned building in Jerusalem's Silwan neighborhood, which is mainly Arabic:

The Jewish-owned Beit Yehonatan building in the east Jerusalem neighborhood of Silwan moved a step closer to becoming legal on Monday, as Interior Minister Eli Yishai authorized the Jerusalem District Building and Planning Committee to hold a vote on the building’s status next week.

Yishai said he had been assured that a majority of council members would vote in favor of declaring the seven-story structure, which was built without the proper permits, to be legal, but that an agreement had been reached with the building’s inhabitants to vacate the top two stories.

[...]

Beit Yehonatan, which is named for imprisoned Israeli spy Jonathan Pollard, has been at the center of an ongoing struggle between Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat and Chief Prosecutor Moshe Lador. In late January, Lador had demanded that Barkat uphold an existing court order to evacuate and seal the building off, which Barkat refused to do.

City Attorney Yossi Havilio also joined Lador’s efforts to force Barkat to act, prompting the mayor to declare last week that he would evacuate and seal Beit Yehonatan, and then begin carrying out demolition orders for more than 200 illegally-built Arab-owned homes in the neighborhood.

While that move was widely seen as a bluff tactic to halt Lador and Havilio’s demands, Havilio responded to Barkat’s assertions with a letter he sent to Lador last Friday, calling into question a number of the details contained in Barkat’s declaration.

[...]

Monday’s apparent error on behalf of the municipality, however, sent right-wing supporters of the eight families who live in Beit Yehonatan into Silwan’s narrow streets, singing and dancing out of sheer joy that the evacuation orders did not find their way to the building’s front door.

City councilman Elisha Peleg along with Jerusalem Deputy Mayor David Hadari were among the supporters, and told reporters that they were pleased with the mix-up and hoped that the issue of illegal building in Silwan – for Jews and Arabs alike – would be settled once and for all.

“We’re opposed to the eviction of Jews from their homes,” Peleg told The Jerusalem Post later on Monday. “And we would like to see this situation resolved without anyone having to be evicted.”

If you'd like a little history on Silwan itself:

(IsraelNN.com) Interior Minister Eli Yishai confirmed Monday night that an agreement has been reached that may prevent the expulsion of Jews from the Jewish-owned Beit Yehonatan building in eastern Jerusalem. The multi-story residence is located in an Arab area formerly populated by Jews who owned the properties but were forced out under the British Mandate.

Just a reminder of the repugnant anti-Jewish bias the British had when they occupied this country.

Yishai is right to deal with this. And as for the Arab residents, well, they're going to have to learn one way or another that not only is this Jewish land we're talking about here, and that Jews have a right to decide where they'll live within it.