The Israeli occupation police on Wednesday morning forced a Palestinian family out of their house in Silwan district of Jerusalem, WAFA news agency reported.
The Silwan-based Wadi Hilweh Information Centre released a video showing police forces and Jewish settlers storming the house and assaulting the family members to seize their house.
The center said that the Siyam family, who lives in the house, refused to comply with the eviction order and at least one family member known as Jawa Siyam was detained.
Jawad Siyam is the director of the Wadi Hilweh Information Center and he was detained in Silwan along with three other local residents.
The Siyam family had been battling a right-wing Israeli settlement group called Elad for 25 years to remain in their home. The Elad society is notorious for its efforts to encourage Jewish settlement in Silwan and around the Old City and the Aqsa Mosque compound.
Elad also confiscated money raised recently to help the Siyam family fight their eviction order, Haaretz newspaper reported on Monday.
Parts of the Siyam family’s building were seized by the state under Israel’s Absentee Property Law – which declares properties belonging to Palestinians who were displaced, often by war or poverty, as “absentee” and therefore state property. These parts of the family home were then sold through straw buyers to Elad.
The eviction came 20 days after an Israeli court ruled in favor of Elad and dismissed the Siyam family’s appeal to remain in their house.
Israel has occupied east Jerusalem, where the Siyam family home is located, since the 1967 war. In 1980, the Jewish state annexed the entire city, claiming it as its “eternal and undivided” capital, a move never recognized by the international community.
In December 2017, US president Donald Trump unilaterally declared Jerusalem Israel’s capital and in May 2018 moved the US embassy to the holy city. Since then, in violation of international law, the Israeli government and Jewish groups have escalated their Judaization practices in the occupied city.
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