Holy Land: Authorities demolish home of wheelchair-bound Palestinian

image: MAP

Source: Medical Aid for Palestinians

Medical Aid for Palestinians (MAP) has strongly condemned the demolition by Israeli authorities of Hatem Abu Riyala's home in Issawiya in East Jerusalem on 1 March. This is the fourth demolition his family have faced since 1999. During a previous demolition Hatem fell from the roof of his house, and is now in a wheelchair as a result of his injuries.

The demolition took place on his son's fourteenth birthday. Hate told media that his children have been in a state of shock ever since.

Speaking to Haaretz, Hatem also described what hurt him the most about the demolition: "They were laughing. Have you no shame? Our heart is burning and you're laughing? The driver of the excavator laughed. Why are you laughing in this situation? In order to tell us: We have broken you. It's people's lives you're demolishing."

In February 2020, three UK MPs - Neil Coyle MP, Jeff Smith MP and Alex Norris MP - met with Hatem while visiting the West Bank on a delegation coordinated by MAP and the Council for Arab British Understanding (Caabu). The visit came soon after the previous demolition in December 2019, when bulldozers tore the top floor off his home without giving him time to remove all the family's belongings.

The delegation climbed over rubble and scattered personal belongings to speak to Hatem. He told the group of his experiences navigating a discriminatory planning regime as he tried to extend his house upwards to meet the needs of his growing family. Hatem, like many other Palestinians in the same situation, told the MPs how he had to pay the Israeli authorities for the costs of the destruction of his home.

"Palestinians don't want to live illegally," Hatem told the group then. "But by affecting people and making their lives unliveable the aim it to coerce them to leave."

Hearing about the recent demolition to Hatem's home, Alex Norris MP said: "I met Hatem last year and it was clear that previous demolitions had a devastating impact on his life. They made living with his disability exceptionally hard as well. Hearing this has happened for a fourth time is profoundly sad. These demolitions do nothing to work toward a peaceful two-state solution."

Israel's planning and zoning regime makes it virtually impossible for Palestinians to build in most of occupied East Jerusalem. Palestinians are only permitted to build on 13% of land in East Jerusalem, most of which is already build up, and only 7% of housing permits in the city are granted to Palestinians, forcing most to build without them.

Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, the rate of demolitions of Palestinian homes and other structures by the Israeli authorities reached a four year high in 2020, affecting livelihoods and increasing Palestinian families' exposure to food insecurity and dependency on humanitarian assistance. In August 2020 MAP, Al Haq and the Jerusalem Legal Aid and Human Rights Centre (JLAC) released a report highlighting how Israel's policies and practices during the COVID-19 pandemic have served to "intensify long-standing grievances and systemic discrimination" against Palestinians in East Jerusalem.

No Israeli authorities were available for comment.