Palestinian need freedom in Jerusalem, not Israeli permits
- Dettagli
- Categoria: Gerusalemme
- Pubblicato Sabato, 14 Aprile 2012 07:54
- Scritto da Hanan Ashrawi
Haaretz, 11.04.12
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| Catholic clergy walk holding candles during the Holy Thursday procession of the Washing of the Feet inside the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, April 5, 2012. Photo by: AP |
we might as well ask the State of Israel how many permits it issues to its Jewish citizens during the celebration of Passover. The answer? Not a single one. Jews from all over the world do not require permits to visit Jerusalem. And neither should Palestinians, regardless of their religious affiliation.
Nevertheless, the focus of the argument continues to be about numbers of permits. (...)Israel attempts to defend its claims of granting freedom of worship in Jerusalem through pictures of foreign Christians, who are incidentally also significant contributors to the Israeli economy, touring the Old City, while Palestinian Christians are slowly being evicted from the core of their spiritual identity.
This weekend, for example, while Israeli security will be setting up barriers to prevent Palestinian Christians from Jerusalem and the rest of Palestine from reaching their prayers in the occupied Old City of Jerusalem, they will be providing facilities for all Jews to reach the Wailing Wall for Pesach prayers. This reflects Israel’s policy of exclusion and control, a policy of turning Occupied East Jerusalem into part of the “eternal and undivided capital of the Jewish people.” In other words, the permit regime is just one aspect of Israel’s strategy to erase the Palestinian Christian and Muslim identity of Occupied East Jerusalem. (...)
Until this happens, ordinary Christian and Muslim Palestinians who want to worship at their holy sites in Jerusalem will continue to apply for permits. They will continue to endure this denial of their basic human rights to worship freely, and more essentially, to move freely, within their own land. Crossing from Bethlehem or Ramallah to Occupied East Jerusalem is not crossing an international border but a humiliating checkpoint dividing Palestinians from Palestinians within the Occupied Palestinian Territory.