The Israeli municipality of West Jerusalem today forced a Palestinian to demolish his own house in Jabal al-Mukabber neighborhood, south of occupied Jerusalem, under the pretext of building without a permit.

Rami al-Zeer told WAFA that the Israeli municipality said if he did not demolish his house on his own, then municipality staff would demolish it and force him to pay exorbitant amounts of money in costs and fines.

He said his house is 80 square meters in area and it houses his family of four people. He built it on his land and while he tried to obtain a license for it, the municipality refused to give him one.

Palestinians accuse the Israeli municipality of discrimination and say that while it builds thousands of housing units for illegal colonists, often on appropriated Palestinian land in occupied East Jerusalem, it denies the indigenous Palestinian citizens the right to build on their own lands and goes as far as demolishing homes they build without the impossible-to-get-permit and force them to pa
y heavy fines.

Source: Palestine news and Information Agency – WAFA