BEIT JALA RESIDENTS CONCERNED ABOUT ROUTE OF

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 JERUSALEM 001829

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

NEA FOR FRONT OFFICE. NSC FOR WATERS/ABRAMS/SINGH

E.O. 12958: DECL: 08/29/2017
TAGS: KWBG PGOV PREL PTER PHUM KPAL IS
SUBJECT: BEIT JALA RESIDENTS CONCERNED ABOUT ROUTE OF
SECURITY BARRIER


Classified By: Acting Principal Officer Thomas M. Duffy per reasons 1.4
(b) and (d)


1. (C) Summary. On August 21, Poloffs saw workers along
Route 60 continuing construction of the security barrier
around Beit Jala, south of Jerusalem, which Beit Jala mayor
Raji Zeidan said will separate his town from nearly fifty
percent of its total land, once completed. Mayor Zeidan and
municipality engineer Samia Zeit told Poloffs that their city
is slowly being cut off from its farmland and expressed worry
about the large number of residents leaving the West Bank.
End Summary.

Barrier Surrounds Beit Jala
--------------


2. (C) On August 21, Poloffs visited the West Bank town of
Beit Jala, eight kilometers south of Jerusalem and one
kilometer west of Bethlehem, with a population of 17,500.
Note: Most of Beit Jala's 17,500 residents are Greek
Orthodox, Catholic and Lutheran, and about one-third is
Muslim. End Note). PolOffs saw construction along Route 60
of the separation barrier and met with Beit Jala mayor Raji
George Jadallah Zeidan and municipal engineer Samia Zeit.
Mayor Zeidan said the completed barrier will separate the
town from nearly fifty percent of its land. According to the
Applied Research Institute Jerusalem (ARIJ),Beit Jala is
14,337 dunams and after the barrier is complete, some 6,420
dunams will on the Jerusalem side of the separation barrier
(four dunams equal approximately one acre). ARIJ estimates
62 percent of Beit Jala's farm land and 87 percent of its
forests will be on the other side of the barrier. According
to Engineer Zeit, the completed barrier will stretch
approximately 11.7 kilometers in and around Beit Jala and
will continue west to the Route 60 tunnel, linking up with an
already-completed section of the barrier that follows Route
60 south towards Hebron.


3. (C) Poloffs also visited Cremisan Monastery and Winery
in the valley between Gilo and Har Gilo settlements.
According to Zeit, the monks prefer that Cremisan be in Beit
Jala, but the barrier's planned route will put it on the
Jerusalem side. Poloffs saw construction of a road that will
connect the Monastery to Jerusalem's Malcha neighborhood and
the Monastery land where approximately 2,200 trees were
cleared on August 15 to allow for barrier construction.
Father Santa Bedon of the Cremisan Monastery confirmed to
PolOff in a subsequent phone call that the trees were cleared
to make way for the road and barrier construction. The
monastery has traditionally been part of Beit Jala, he said,
but the monks had no choice about which side of the barrier
the monastery will be on.

Beit Jala Farmland Serves as Path of Barrier
--------------


4. (C) According to Engineer Zeit, since 2002, Beit Jala
landowners have received Israeli military orders informing
them that the barrier will be constructed on their land. She
said once a landowner receives a military order, generally
attached to a rock on his property, he has ten days to file a
complaint with the GoI Civil Administration. Zeit told
Poloffs that her family has owned forty dunams of land in the
valley between Gilo and Har Gilo since Ottoman times. She
said in 2005, her family, and others from Beit Jala who had
received military orders, challenged the path of the barrier
in the Israeli court system, but the case is not resolved.
Zeit said constructing the barrier along the edge of Beit
Jala rather than Gilo means "the Israelis are closing us
inside a small urban area."

Employment Prospects Bleak
--------------


5. (C) Makram al-Arja, owner of Everest Hotel which stands
close to a partially-constructed section of the security
barrier, told Poloffs that he received military orders
stating that eleven of his eighteen dunams, as well as a
small building, will be absorbed by the path of the barrier.
Al-Arja said that his family has run the hotel since the
forties and it is "the last place where Israeli and
Palestinian businessmen can meet without permits." With the
completion of the barrier, al-Arja worries his business will
deteriorate, and his hotel will no longer be an
Israeli-Palestinian meeting place. Zeidan and Zeit also
expressed worry about the large number of residents moving to
the U.S. and Latin AMERICA for jobs and leaving behind a
"ghost town."


JERUSALEM 00001829 002 OF 002


Bio Note
--------------


6. (C) Raji George Jadallah Zeidan has been mayor of Beit
Jala since 1998. In 2005, he was re-elected as an
Independent, winning 2,892 votes. Zeidan is an American
citizen, naturalized through his wife. He lived in Nebraska
where his children completed their higher education. Zeidan
said that he now holds residency in California.
DUFFY