Experts and specialists warned on Sunday of the dangerous situation in Silwan town south of al-Aqsa Mosque in Occupied Jerusalem due to the excavation works and the tunnels being dug in the area under the supervision of the Israeli government and settlement associations.
The Experts and Engineers Committee said that these Israeli excavations have reached an advanced stage increasing the cracks in the Palestinian houses in the area.
A member of the committee who preferred not to be named said that there is an Israeli scheme aimed at evacuating the Palestinian citizens from Wadi Hilweh area in Silwan to allow settlers to expand in the area which they call the “City of David”.
He pointed out that the excavation works conducted in Silwan by the Israeli occupation authorities and Elad settlement association do not take into account the safety conditions of the Palestinian houses above those tunnels nor care about the lives of the Palestinian citizens living in them.
He affirmed that the Palestinian houses in Silwan are now without foundations which means that any minor quake might lead to the collapse of the entire area.
Nehad Siam an inhabitant of one of the threatened houses said “Residents hear the noise of diggings under the houses on daily basis.”
Siam told the PIC that three houses were evacuated in the area while there are five houses that sustain growing cracks every day.
He accused the Israeli municipality’s engineers who came to inspect the damages caused in the houses by these excavations of coordinating with settlers and exchanging roles with them to carry out their plan of displacing the Palestinian citizens and removing their houses.
The Palestinian lawyer Sami Arshid had previously stated that he will ask an Israeli court to issue a decision to stop the excavations carried out under the citizens’ houses in Wadi Hilweh and will demand the Israeli authorities to take the necessary measures to secure safety of the citizens and their property.
The Experts and Engineers Committee barely managed to obtain copies of the maps of the tunnels dug underground and found out that the Israeli authorities are planning to establish malls an information center and large exhibition halls under the neighborhood.
The committee emphasized through its field follow-up of the houses in the neighborhood that more than 50 houses were variously affected by these excavations with cracks spreading on walls and roofs and damages inflicted to the foundations of a number of houses.
It pointed out that those houses have been suffering from Israeli excavations in the area for 4 years but over the past months the pace of these excavations started increasing significantly and dangerously.
