OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, (PIC)
The Europeans for Jerusalem organization reported that Israeli occupation forces committed 8,951 violations during the year 2024, seeking to impose a new de facto in the holy city while exploiting the focus on the war in Gaza.
In an executive summary of the main violations by the Israeli occupation and settlers in occupied Jerusalem during 2024, the organization confirmed that the year witnessed extensive Israeli assaults, attempts to impose a new de facto based on Judaization and settlement expansion, and dangerous plans affecting Al-Aqsa Mosque aimed at changing the demographic and cultural identity of the occupied city of Jerusalem.
According to the report, the occupation forces executed 443 incidents of gunfire and direct assaults in the neighborhoods of occupied Jerusalem, resulting in 26 martyrs, including 25 Palestinians and one Turk. Among the martyrs were 12 children and one woman. Additionally, 106 Palestinians were injured by live ammunition or after being hit with gas canisters, while dozens suffered from gas inhalation. A total of 245 citizens were assaulted by the occupation forces.
The report noted that the occupation forces held the bodies of 11 Palestinians they killed, including 5 children, and later returned one of them. This raises the number of the bodies of martyrs from Jerusalem being held by the occupation authorities in refrigerators and numbered graves to 45 by the end of 2024.
The report documented 4,407 incursions into towns and neighborhoods in Jerusalem, during which 1,248 citizens were arrested, including 112 children and 65 women. It also mentioned that 119 others were summoned and 68 were placed under house arrest.
During 2024, the report recorded 384 demolition and leveling operations, including 91 cases of forced self-demolitions and 259 demolitions executed by occupation machinery, in addition to 29 leveling operations. The occupation forces issued 343 demolition, removal, or evacuation notifications.
The occupation forces carried out 19 appropriations of properties, including residential apartments and land. Such appropriations particularly target homes and apartments to establish settler outposts within Palestinian neighborhoods, claiming these lands or homes were purchased from settlers. Settlement organizations, supported by ministers in the extremist occupation government, encourage such appropriations.
The report highlighted the occupation’s efforts to impose demographic changes in Jerusalem, employing all of its governmental, political, and security apparatuses for this purpose. Simultaneously, it allows settlers and their organizations to control as many properties in the city as possible.
The report documented 54 Israeli decisions and measures aimed at solidifying settlement and Judaization in occupied Jerusalem, which involved the confiscation of dozens of dunums and the approval of settlement projects and the establishment of new settlement units. Among these decisions, the occupation approved 19 settlement projects and began executing 12 of them.
Assault on Al-Aqsa Mosque
The report noted the participation of 60,792 settlers and 41,001 labeled as tourists in the incursions of Al-Aqsa Mosque during 2024.
It was evident, according to the report, that the occupation is exploiting the focus on the Israeli war on Gaza in an attempt to impose de facto Judaization of Jerusalem.
Forced expulsion
Israeli authorities continued to implement policies of expulsion from Al-Aqsa Mosque or the city of Jerusalem. The report documented the issuance of 102 expulsion orders during 2024.
Settler assaults
The report documented 161 assaults carried out by settlers in Jerusalem neighborhoods, including 20 incidents of physical harm, as well as property damage, writing racist slogans, and burning vehicles. This number does not include incursions and practices during the incursions of Al-Aqsa Mosque.
In 2024, the report recorded over 730 violations, which included the establishment of barriers, road closures, and the imposition of collective punishment measures, and documented 8 travel bans.
The report indicated that occupation forces continued to violate the economic, social, and cultural rights of Jerusalemites, carrying out hundreds of raids on markets and shops and imposing exorbitant fines.
They also continued to tighten restrictions on Palestinian education and attempted to impose the Israelization of education. The restrictions further targeted educational institutions and Jerusalemite students, the Palestinian curriculum, religious sites, landmarks, and incited against international institutions in Jerusalem (UNRWA), which was banned.
Attacks on Christians
The report documented at least 7 major assaults carried out by occupation soldiers or settlers against Christians. In February, settlers attacked a German priest, Father “Nikodemus Schnabel,” head of the Benedictine monks in the Holy Land, spitting on him and insulting Jesus Christ while he was walking in the Old City of occupied Jerusalem.
In March, the occupation deprived thousands of Christians this year from accessing Jerusalem to celebrate Easter according to the Western calendar, as well as Palm Sunday, the Stations of the Cross, Good Friday, and Holy Saturday, and participate in religious rituals.
Recommendations
Europeans for Jerusalem warned of the seriousness of the violations occurring in Jerusalem by the Israeli occupation, the unchecked actions of extremist settlers against citizens, and attempts to impose new conditions at Al-Aqsa Mosque, alongside the increasing suffering of Jerusalemites, in parallel with the ongoing policies of Judaization and repeated incursions into Al-Aqsa Mosque, attempts to impose temporal and spatial division of the Mosque, and repeated assaults on the Bab al-Rahma prayer area with attempts to close it.
They called on the international community to take responsibility for the city of Jerusalem and its Palestinian residents, protecting them as they are residents of an occupied area according to the decisions of the UN Security Council and the General Assembly, and to bear responsibility for them given that Jerusalem is under international responsibility according to the General Assembly Resolution 181.
