Jerusalem: The Jerusalem Governorate announced on Monday that the approval by the 'Jerusalem District Planning and Building Committee' of the Israeli occupation municipality in Jerusalem to deposit a new colonial plan for establishing approximately 450 colonial units in the Umm Lison neighborhood, southeast of occupied Jerusalem, marks a significant escalation in the imposition of colonial facts on the ground.
According to Palestine News and Information Agency - WAFA, the Governorate emphasized that the plan targets creating the largest colonial concentration within a Palestinian neighborhood in East Jerusalem, flagrantly violating international law and United Nations Security Council resolutions 2334 and 478. Estimates suggest the project could accommodate nearly 2,000 colonists, representing the largest colonial project inside a Palestinian neighborhood in East Jerusalem.
The Governorate highlighted that the project's establishment deep within the Palestinian urban fabric aims not just to provide housing for colonists but to impose a new geographic and demographic reality that would be challenging to reverse. This project is part of a broader colonial system aiming to dismantle Palestinian geography in southern occupied Jerusalem, alongside other projects like 'Arnona Hills,' 'Givat Shaked,' 'Lower Aqueduct,' and 'Givat Hamatos.'
These initiatives are designed to separate Umm Lison from Jabal al-Mukabbir, isolate Sur Baher, Umm Tuba, and Beit Safafa from their natural extensions toward Bethlehem, Beit Sahour, and Beit Jala, restrict Palestinian urban expansion, and encircle Jerusalem neighborhoods with connected colonial blocs, thereby imposing a new colonial reality.
The Jerusalem Governorate stressed that Palestinians in Jerusalem face a comprehensive colonial replacement project, not merely isolated violations. This project expands colonization, seizes land, demolishes homes, imposes planning restrictions, and isolates Palestinian neighborhoods. These policies aim to reshape the political, legal, geographic, and demographic reality of the city, support the annexation and Judaization project, and undermine the establishment of an independent Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital, violating international humanitarian law, the Fourth Geneva Convention, and relevant United Nations resolutions.