Mohammed el Kurd, the child of the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood in East Jerusalem

Audio 03:30

Trilingual sign at the entrance to the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood in East Jerusalem.

© Tamar Hayardeni / Wikimedia.org

By: Sami Boukhelifa Follow

9 mins

Our summer series “

Live my student life

” meets Mohamed el Kurd, a young Palestinian student from the emblematic neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah in East Jerusalem.

He, his family and their neighbors risk eviction from their homes in favor of Israeli settlers.

Since his childhood, the young man has documented his life under the occupation, the violence of the settlers, the repression of Israeli forces in this part of the city annexed in 1967 by the Hebrew state.

A report by our permanent special correspondent, Sami Boukhelifa.

Publicity

Despite himself, Mohamed El Kurd has become the spokesperson for Sheikh Jarrah's neighborhood.

That day, he continued interviews with the international media.

At 23, the young man is in his final year of a Masters in Literature at Brooklyn College.

I returned from New York last April.

I left college in the middle of the semester.

I had no choice, I absolutely had to come back to support my family.

I am one of the few people in the neighborhood to speak English, and to accept being in the media

 ”.

For nearly fifty years, the district of Sheikh Jarrah has been at the heart of a legal battle.

It pits Palestinian residents against

Nahalat Shimon International

.

Little by little, this organization of settlers, which claimed ownership of the land, took possession of Palestinian homes.

In 2009, this Zionist settler organization took over part of our house. Obviously, this was done with the help of the Israeli occupation forces. Today an American Jewish settler lives with us. Israeli government propaganda tries to make it seem like a simple real estate dispute between a tenant and a landlord. But when you have Israeli religious deputies, who come here, to us, just to provoke us, you understand that this is not just a real estate dispute. It is a policy of forced displacement of Palestinians. When we say: we live under a fascist regime, these are not empty words. The Israeli government works methodically to beat us, insult us and repress us

. "

Stun grenades, mounted police, sewage cannon, Sheikh Jarrah is under siege by the Israeli police.

Regularly, gatherings of united Palestinians who came to support the residents of the neighborhood are dispersed by force.

I'm a student, but I also lecture on police violence to first-year students at my university in the United States.

In recent weeks, I have been teaching my lessons via the Zoom application.

And sometimes, in the middle of my lectures, my students in New York would hear the blasts here in Sheikh Jarrah.

Sometimes I even had to interrupt the class because the air was getting stale from the tear gas.

My students understood well what was happening here

”.

Mohamed el Kurd, who grew up in Sheikh Jarrah, Palestinian sector of East Jerusalem, sees his neighborhood change.

The streets still bear the names of the companions of the Prophet of Islam, but around his home, more and more colonists, sometimes armed, are settling.

Study or participate in the struggle: the student's dilemma

The settlers enjoy total impunity.

They are like the Israeli government which commits crimes against Palestinians without being worried.

These people do whatever they want, and they are not accountable to anyone.

These criminals are a pure product of the Zionist entity.

Here, a settler, and I mean a settler not a soldier, could decide to kill me, and there will be no consequences.

It has already happened that a settler kills a Palestinian, without any legal consequences.

"

To be a Palestinian student is also that for Mohamed el Kurd: to face a permanent dilemma.

Fight against the occupation, or try to pursue its objectives, and leave Jerusalem.

Ideally I would like to go back to New York, but I don't want to abandon my loved ones here, so I haven't made up my mind yet.

Because of this situation I am completely in the dark, they stole my ambitions, my hope and my future.

I can't even concentrate on my studies and think about my degree anymore.

But despite all this as a Palestinian I am part of a people who never give up

 ”.

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  • Israelo-Palestinian conflict

  • Palestinian territories

  • Israel