The Aftermath of a Home Demolition

The Jerusalem Municipality is on a home demolition spree in al-Bustan.

So far this year, it has demolished eight homes belonging to the al-Qadi, Abu Diab, al-Ruwaidi, and Ayed families, leaving more than 40 people—half of them children—homeless. Additionally, the municipality has demolished part of a public park frequented by the locals, the offices of the al-Bustan Association, as well as its community center there.1

The push appears to be coming at a time when the city and the state feel emboldened to act now, secure in the knowledge that Donald Trump will return to the White House and the current administration is turning a blind eye.

The area, which has been populated since before 1967, has been targeted by the city for decades. In 1977, 10 years after occupying East Jerusalem, the city approved the Silwan and Old City Basin Master Plan (Directive of Plan No. 9), which designated the al-Bustan area of the Silwan neighborhood a “green space,” meaning that residential construction is banned there, despite Palestinians having built homes in the neighborhood before and after 1967. This “green space” serves the municipality’s plan to further Judaize the city.2

In 2010, the city advanced Plan No. 18000, which called for al-Bustan to be turned into a touristic and archaeological Judeo-centric biblical park called the King’s Garden. The park would be an extension of the City of David national park located northeast of Silwan and south of the Old City and would effectively complete a tourist “ring” around the Old City at the expense of its residents.3

Due to the “green space” declaration and the government’s refusal to create a proper zoning plan in the neighborhood to legalize construction or to consider the plan that they worked hard to develop and propose, al-Bustan residents have been left with no choice but to resort to building without permits, which is illegal under Israeli law. An additional 108 homes stand at risk of demolition and about 1,500 Palestinians at risk of displacement.4

Having exhausted all legal avenues, al-Bustan residents’ final hope is international intervention or opposition to the plan, which so far has delayed it by a decade. However, that is not a reliable solution to the imminent tragedy.

What happens to the displaced al-Bustan residents?

Jerusalem Story followed up with Mohammed Hisham Ayed and his brother, Haitham, whose two al-Bustan homes were demolished on November 5, 2024, as Americans were heading to the polls in their presidential election. The houses, which were built in 1995, were demolished, and the family was fined NIS 80,000 for construction without a permit throughout the years.5 Theirs were two homes of the seven demolished in that single day.

Because the city offered no alternative housing for these residents, they are left homeless, living out of their car.

Haitham expressed in an Al Jazeera interview that he and his brother denied the city any sense of victory. Instead of simply demolishing their homes “in less than two hours” as ordered, they paid nearly NIS 100,000 to remain here. Haitham said, following the demolition: “I won’t put up a tent here. I’d rather live here without a tent.”6

Mohammed, 48, reported in an interview with Jerusalem Story that he has a medical condition which prevents him from working. Mohammed is now living out of a car atop of the rubble of his home. “I feel suffocated . . . the feeling in the moment of the demolition is indescribable. It’s extremely difficult,” he shared. With himself in one place, his wife and kids in another, he says, “We know no other place; we don’t know how to live anywhere else.”7

The al-Bustan neighborhood has been heavily targeted with demolitions, and there is no salvation in sight. Haitham, in his Al Jazeera interview, said: “It’s painful when someone who has no authority over you comes and demolishes your home. There’s nothing you can do; you’re helpless. You’re unable to even defend yourself.”8

“If they demolish our homes, and we rebuild and they demolish them 100 times again, we are here, present on our land, the land of our ancestors,” Mohammed told Jerusalem Story. “We are not leaving.”9