JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israeli authorities in Jerusalem said on Tuesday they had no immediate plans to demolish scores of Arab homes in the east of the city but that they had designated the area for a park.
Palestinians said on Monday the Israeli-controlled municipality of Jerusalem was preparing to evict 1,500 Palestinians and demolish 88 homes in East Jerusalem’s Silwan district, to convert it into an open public space.
The dispute is part of a wider conflict over Jerusalem. Israel regards all of the city as its capital, including East Jerusalem and adjacent parts of the West Bank annexed since their capture in 1967, a claim not recognised internationally.
Some 500,000 Israelis live in the settlements, which are considered illegal internationally.
Ahead of next week’s visit by new U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Palestinian officials are seeking support against what they say are Israeli plans to drive Arabs from the city and cut off occupied Arab East Jerusalem from territory on which they hope to establish a Palestinian state.
City officials said there were no immediate plans to evict Palestinians from Silwan or demolish any homes, but the Israeli mayor of Jerusalem, Nir Barkat, confirmed in a statement the area was scheduled for use as a recreational area.
The city’s deputy mayor, Naomi Tsur, told Reuters that Barkat’s administration, elected in November, was working on a zoning plan for the area but vowed first to seek an “understanding with all the residents of the city.”
Silwan, a mostly Palestinian neighbourhood next to Jerusalem’s old walled city and its holy sites, has been a flashpoint of conflict.
U.S. special envoy George Mitchell was due in the region for talks ahead of Clinton’s planned visit to Israel and the Palestinian territories on March 3.
Rafiq al-Husseini, chief of staff for Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, took foreign diplomats on a tour on Tuesday of another disputed settlement zone near Jerusalem, known as E1.
“If the Israelis continue with this settlement policy in and outside of East Jerusalem then there cannot be peace at all,” Husseini said of the E1 plan.
Palestinians say the plan could prevent the creation of a contiguous Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital.
Writing by Ivan Karakashian and Allyn Fisher-Ilan; editing by Andrew Roche
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