Identifier
Created
Classification
Origin
06JERUSALEM1319
2006-03-30 16:28:00
CONFIDENTIAL
Consulate Jerusalem
Cable title:  

EVICTION FINALLY COMES FOR EAST JERUSALEM FAMILY

Tags:  PREL PGOV PHUM KWBG KPAL IS 
pdf how-to read a cable
VZCZCXYZ0017
OO RUEHWEB

DE RUEHJM #1319/01 0891628
ZNY CCCCC ZZH
O 301628Z MAR 06
FM AMCONSUL JERUSALEM
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC IMMEDIATE 1299
INFO RUEHXK/ARAB ISRAELI COLLECTIVE PRIORITY
RHEHNSC/WHITE HOUSE NSC PRIORITY
C O N F I D E N T I A L JERUSALEM 001319 

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

NEA FOR FRONT OFFICE, NSC FOR ABRAMS/DORAN/MUSTAFA

E.O. 12958: DECL: 03/30/2016
TAGS: PREL PGOV PHUM KWBG KPAL IS
SUBJECT: EVICTION FINALLY COMES FOR EAST JERUSALEM FAMILY

REF: A. 1998 JERUSALEM 002981


B. 1998 JERUSALEM 003423

C. 1999 JERUSALEM 001726

D. 2003 JERUSALEM 000891

E. 2004 JERUSALEM 000086

F. 2004 TEL AVIV 00174

Classified By: Consul General Jake Walles, per reasons 1.4 (b) and (d).

This cable has been cleared by Embassy Tel Aviv.

C O N F I D E N T I A L JERUSALEM 001319

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

NEA FOR FRONT OFFICE, NSC FOR ABRAMS/DORAN/MUSTAFA

E.O. 12958: DECL: 03/30/2016
TAGS: PREL PGOV PHUM KWBG KPAL IS
SUBJECT: EVICTION FINALLY COMES FOR EAST JERUSALEM FAMILY

REF: A. 1998 JERUSALEM 002981


B. 1998 JERUSALEM 003423

C. 1999 JERUSALEM 001726

D. 2003 JERUSALEM 000891

E. 2004 JERUSALEM 000086

F. 2004 TEL AVIV 00174

Classified By: Consul General Jake Walles, per reasons 1.4 (b) and (d).

This cable has been cleared by Embassy Tel Aviv.


1. (C) Summary. An East Jerusalem Palestinian family,
engaged in a protracted legal battle with the Government of
Israel (GOI) to maintain ownership of their home in Silwan,
was summarily evicted March 29. According to an attorney
involved in the case, privately hired Israeli security
guards, working in conjunction with Israeli Border Police,
carried out the removal of the Guzlan family less than one
hour after receiving a notice of eviction. Israeli human
rights activists have criticized the handling of the
eviction, but an official from the Jerusalem mayor's office
asserted that the eviction was carried out in accordance with
Israeli court orders. The Guzlan property case, which has
received considerable USG attention and intervention since
the 1990s (REFS A-F),was notable in part due to the Guzlan
grandfather's role in protecting the Jewish residents of
Silwan during the 1929 Arab riots. End summary.

Guzlan Family Evicted
From Silwan Home
--------------


2. (C) Jerusalem attorney Danny Seidemann notified Poloff
March 29 that Ahmad Guzlan -- a client of Seidemann's since
the early 1990s -- was being evicted from his family home in
East Jerusalem's Silwan neighborhood. Daniela Yanai, staff
attorney for Ir Amin, an Israeli NGO involved in the Guzlan
case, told Poloff that the family was presented an eviction
letter by two Israeli Border Police at their entrance to
their home at approximately 0830 Local March 29. Yanai said
that the eviction letter informed the family that it would be
removed from the premises that day. Less than one hour
later, approximately 20 to 30 private Israeli security guards
arrived to remove the Guzlan's home furnishings into waiting
moving vans. (Note: Yanai did not know if the security
guards were employed by the GOI or other private interests.
End note.) Arik Ascherman from the Israeli NGO Rabbis For
Human Rights reported that the eviction was completed later
that afternoon.


3. (C) Both Yanai and Ascherman suspected that El-Ad, an
Israeli settler organization, may have played a role in the
Guzlan's eviction. Yanai said that the Guzlan house, located
on the Silwan hillside near the ruins of the biblical City of
David, has significant interest for El-Ad, which has
spearheaded efforts to purchase and occupy houses in the
area. Yanai indicated that between four to five houses in
the immediate vicinity to the Guzlan home are already
occupied by Jewish families affiliated with El-Ad. Yanai did
not know who gave the order to evict the family on March 29,
but Jerusalem municipal official Mordechai Levy told ConGen
Poloff that the eviction was carried out in accordance with
previous Israeli court decisions.

Eviction Marks End to
Protracted Legal Struggle
--------------


4. (C) The Guzlan family has been locked in a legal battle
with the Jewish National Fund (JNF) since the early 1980s
over ownership of the land. A Guzlan family member sold the
land to the JNF in 1923. The Guzlan family subsequently
built a home on the land in 1966. While an Israeli court
ruled in favor of the JNF in 1987, the organization had
refrained from evicting the family because of pressure from
the GOI and anticipated negative publicity of evicting the
Guzlan family, whose grandfather received a letter of
commendation from the Jewish communities of Silwan and
Jerusalem in 1929 for his role in sheltering Jews during the
riots of that year. The JNF, which had spent 16 years trying
to evict the Guzlan family from their residence, sold the
property in 2003 to the Israel Lands Authority (ILA). The
ILA had subsequently obtained a series of eviction notices
which were never enforced.

Timing of Eviction Questioned
--------------


5. (C) Both Yanai and Ascherman speculated that the timing
of the March 29 eviction -- one day after the Israeli Knesset
elections -- was meant to avoid public scrutiny. They also
noted that Israelis on March 29 occupied several apartments
in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of A-Tor (Mount of Olives).

WALLES