Occupied Jerusalem .. Between The Past, Present and Future / Video & Report
2017 is coming to end. For the Palestinian people. 2017 marks 100 years since the Belfour declaration, 70 years since the partition plan, 50 years since the occupation, 30 years since the onset of the popular Intifada and 25 years since the inauguration of the Madrid conference for peace in the Middle East. It also marks the beginning of Trump’s rule with its worldwide ramifications by and large and his ill-fated recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. By this decision, Trump has overturned the longstanding international commitment to a two-state solution with Jerusalem as the capital of both states or West Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and East Jerusalem as the capital of Palestine.
On June 28, 1967, the Israeli government illegally and unilaterally annexed Jerusalem to the Israeli state and declared ‘Unified Jerusalem’ as the eternal capital of Israel. When the Israeli government illegally redrew the municipal boundary of the West Bank, it annexed sparsely populated parts of other Palestinian governorates to Jerusalem, and excluded the highly populated Palestinian neighborhoods. From this point onwards, Israel embarked on a campaign to manipulate the demographic and geographical realities of the city in order to emphasize its claim and sovereignty over Jerusalem. To achieve this goal, consecutive Israeli governments improvised several laws to increase the number of Jews, and reduce the number of Palestinians, living in the city, to expunge its Arabic culture and history, and evacuate the city of its Palestinian inhabitants. Soon after the occupation of the city in 1967, the Israeli government illegally redrew occupied East Jerusalem municipal boundary, increasing its area from 6.5 Km2 to 71 Km2 to include areas from 28 surrounding Palestinian villages. Accordingly, the area of the new and illegally defined boundary of occupied East Jerusalem was classified.