Clashes erupted after breakfast this evening, Wednesday, between a number of residents of the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood in East Jerusalem and their solidarity with them, and Jewish settlers over a case that the Israeli judiciary is looking into regarding the evacuation of Palestinian homes for the benefit of settlers in the neighborhood.
The settlers shouted at the Palestinians in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood - a part of the eastern side of Jerusalem that was occupied by Israel in the 1967 Middle East war - "Go back to Jordan."
Let the Palestinians respond to them by accusing them of racism and mafia methods.
The confrontations take place during the holy month of Ramadan over the issue of evacuating Palestinian homes in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood, as several Palestinian families are facing expulsion from their homes on land claimed by settlers.
Tomorrow's session
On Thursday, the Israeli Supreme Court will hold a main session to decide the case, and the court may decide to uphold a decision issued by a lower court to vacate homes, and it may rule that Palestinian families threatened with expulsion can appeal the lower court's decision.
Over the past week, riot police moved on horseback in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood, arrested a number of Palestinian youths, and used water cannons to pump a foul-smelling liquid to disperse the crowds of protesters against the efforts to expel Palestinians from their homes.
Palestinian medics said that 12 Palestinians had been injured since last Sunday in the latest clashes, and 3 of them required hospital treatment, and the Israeli police said that protesters threw stones and fireworks at them during the protests.
Historical background
Palestinians say they have lived in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood since the 1950s, when Jordan resettled them, after they fled or were forced from their homes in West Jerusalem and Haifa during the fighting that erupted during the creation of Israel in 1948.
Jordan built housing in the neighborhood to house the Palestinians who were displaced in 1948, and has lease contracts to prove that.
According to documents published by the Jordanian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, they belong to 28 families in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood, who were displaced due to the 1948 war.
On the other hand, the Israeli anti-settlement group Peace Now stated that the settlers who filed the lawsuits to evacuate Palestinian homes said that they legally purchased the land from two Jewish organizations that had purchased the land at the end of the 19th century.