Israeli municipality forced a Palestinian store owner to demolish his own shop in Silwan town south of Occupied Jerusalem on Tuesday.
The Jerusalemite family razed their shop after Israeli municipality of Jerusalem threatened to demolish it under the pretext that it was built without a permit and to force them to pay exorbitant demolition costs according to Majdi al-Abbasi member of the family.
He added that over the past two years the family received several demolition notices by the municipality. Twenty days ago Israeli crews however handed the family a demolition notice stipulating razing their shop at any moment.
Abbasi stated that his family preferred to raze their store by themselves because they cannot afford the too high expenses of having it knocked down by the municipality.
He noted that the store’s area is estimated at 55 square meters and it was built with metal siding. It was constructed two years ago he added.
This is the second self-demolition of structures in Silwan in the past 48 hours after another Palestinian resident demolished a part of his house in Silwan for the same reason following Israeli municipality threats to demolish the house and force him to pay unreasonable costs for the demolition.
Jerusalemite people usually choose to demolish their own buildings in order to avoid the extremely high costs which could reach up to 80000 shekels if being done by Israeli municipality.
