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Le conflit foncier de Cheikh Jarrah est un litige de longue date concernant la propriété de certaines terres et de certains logements à Cheikh Jarrah, un quartier de Jérusalem-Est. Il est considéré comme un microcosme des conflits israélo-palestiniens sur les terres depuis 1948. La législation israélienne autorise les Juifs à déposer des réclamations concernant des terres situées en Cisjordanie et à Jérusalem-Est qui leur auraient appartenu avant 1948, mais rejette celles des Palestiniens concernant des terres situées en Israël qu’ils auraient possédées. Dans ce cas précis, les réfugiés palestiniens n’ont ainsi pas le droit, selon la législation israélienne, de reprendre possessions de leurs anciennes maisons à Haïfa, Sarafand et Jaffa.

Ce conflit est considéré comme faisant partie de la stratégie de colonisation du gouvernement israélien dans le « bassin sacré » de Jérusalem. Arié King, un maire adjoint de Jérusalem et l’un des fondateurs de l’implantation coloniale urbaine Maalé Hazeitim, a déclaré au New York Times que le litige concernant les propriétés foncières de Cheick Jarrah faisait partie d’une stratégie municipale afin de créer des « couches de Juifs » au sein de Jérusalem-Est.

Contexte juridique

En 1948, environ 850000 Palestiniens ont été évacués de force de leurs maisons et environ 400 villes et villages palestiniens ont été dépeuplés dans les zones tombés sous contrôle israélien. A Jérusalem-Ouest, l’écrasante majorité de la communauté palestinienne aisée, soit environ 28000 personnes, a fuit ou a été expulsée et leurs biens saccagés, confisqués et distribués aux Juifs. Seulement quelques 750 personnes d’entre-elles (surtout des Grecs et des Chrétiens) ont été autorisées à rester. Dans le même temps, quelques centaines de Juifs ont évacués une douzaine à Jérusalem-Est et en Cisjoradanie ; ceux-ci ont reçu des propriétés à Jérusalem-Ouest qui appartenaient à des Palestiniens. Près de 10000 maisons palestiniennes dans le seul secteur ouest de Jérusalem, pour la plupart entièrement meublées, ont été occupées et leurs propriétaires d’origine, ainsi que des Palestiniens possédant des biens dans d’autres parties de la Palestine mandataire et de ce qui est ensuite devenu Israël, se sont vus refuser le droit de réclamer leurs biens. En revanche, en 1970, Israël a promulgué une loi permettant aux Juifs de récupérer les biens qu’ils possédaient auparavant à Jérusalem-Est, bien qu’ils aient déjà reçu en compensation des biens expropriés appartenant auparavant à des Palestiniens. Cette asymétrie est souligné par de nombreux observateurs.

Cet accord n’existe pas dans le reste de la Cisjordanie, le gouvernement israélien ayant estimé qu’il créerait des tensions, mettrait en danger l’ordre public et amènerait à des demandes équivalentes voire plus nombreuses de la part des Palestiniens de Cisjordanie pour récupérer leurs biens en Israël.

Période ottomane

La propriété dont il est particulièrement question dans ce litige concerne les quartiers juifs Shimon HaTzadik et Nahalat Shimon. L'association de colons affirme qu'il s'agit d'une propriété acheté à des propriétaires terriens arabes en 1876 par la communauté juive de la Palestine ottomane. Selon des documents ottomans produits par cette association, les registres fonciers ottomans montrent que la propriété a été enregistrée au nom des rabins Avraham Ashkenazi et Meir Auerbach. L'Haldane Society of Socialist Lawyers a cependant remis en question l'authenticité de ceux-ci. Un tribunal israélien a déclaré qu'ils étaient bel et bien authentiques.

La construction de logements à Nahalat Shimon a commencé en 1891 pour loger les juifs yéménites et sépharades pauvres.

Le terrain de cette propriété était adjacent à ce que certains croyaient être le site du tombeau de Shimon HaTzadik, un grand prêtre juif du IIIe siècle avant notre ère. Le consensus universitaire, se basant sur une inscription in situ, tend davantage a montré qu'il s'agit du site funéraire d'une matrone romaine - Julia Sabina - datant du IIe sècle de notre ère.

Jordanian period

Jews in Nahalat Shimon on their way to the Tomb of Simeon the Just, 1927 In 1947, there were about 100 Jewish houses in the neighborhood.^{[citation needed]} In March 1948, due to mounting Arab violence in the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, the British authorities ordered the residents to evacuate within two hours.^{[citation needed]} East Jerusalem came under Jordanian rule following the 1948 War. The Jordanians expelled all Jews from East Jerusalem, and the Jordanian Custodian of Enemy Property was established in 1948 to handle property taken from Jews that had fled or been expelled from the territories then under Jordan control, including the property in question. The evacuated Jewish residents were resettled in Palestinian homes in West Jerusalem.

In 1956, the Jordanian government, in cooperation with the United Nations Palestinian relief agency UNRWA and the Custodian, housed 28 Palestinian refugee families in Sheikh Jarrah, who were required to pay rent to the Custodian.

Under Israeli occupation

After the neighbourhood fell under Israeli control after the Six-Day War in 1967, the status of the property has been in dispute. At the time, there were no Jews living in the Sheikh Jarrah neighbourhood. Palestinian refugees who had been expelled or displaced from their homes in Jaffa and Haifa in the 1947–1949 Palestine war and their descendants were housed in the Sheikh Jarrah district. No Jews lived in the neighbourhood until the 2000s.^{[citation needed]}

In 1972, the Israeli Custodian General registered the properties under the Jewish trusts, which in turn demanded that the Palestinian tenants pay rent to the trusts. In 1980, Israel annexed East Jerusalem, including the property in question, and in consequence Israeli property laws commenced to apply to these properties. Under Israeli land and property laws, Israelis have the right to reclaim properties in East Jerusalem that had been owned by them before the 1948 Arab–Israeli War,^{[citation needed]} but the reverse does not apply,^{[citation needed]} despite Palestinian claims to dispossessed land being far more numerous.^{[citation needed]} The Palestinian Authority does not recognise the Israeli annexation of Jerusalem and insists that Palestinian land laws apply to land transactions in East Jerusalem, which forbid any sale of land to Jews.

In 1982, the Palestinian residents signed an agreement accepting Jewish ownership of the land while being allowed to live there as protected tenants. The Palestinian residents have since repudiated the agreement, saying they were tricked into signing it. They have ceased paying rent.

The two Jewish trusts that have been held by the Israeli courts to be owners of the property, the Sephardi Community Committee and the Committee of the Knesset of Israel, sold the homes to the right-wing Nahalat Shimon settler association, that has since made repeated attempts to evict the Palestinian residents in order to enable Jewish settlers to move in.

Evictions

Sheikh Jarrah demonstration against eviction of Palestinian families, August 2010 In 2001, Israeli settlers moved into a sealed section of the al-Kurd family's house in the compound of Shimon HaTzadik and refused to leave, claiming the property was owned by Jews. The dispute was heard by the Jerusalem District Court, which ruled in 2008 that the property belonged to the Sephardi Community Committee. It also ruled that the Arab families would have protected tenant status as long as they paid rent. However, several families refused to pay rent to the settler association, leading to their eviction. The al-Kurds were evicted in November 2008.

The court ruling was based on an Ottoman-era bill of sale. Lawyers for the Jewish families argued that documents from the Ottoman Empire originally used to prove that a Jewish Sephardic organization had purchased the land in question in the 19th century are indeed valid. However, in 2009, after the court hearing had been finalised, the authenticity of these documents was challenged on the basis that the building had only been rented to the Sephardi group. The lawyers for the Palestinians produced documents from Istanbul's Ottoman archives purporting to show that the Jewish organization that claims to own the land only rented it, and as such was not the rightful owner. The al-Kurd family claims that when they pressed the court to look at the new evidence, they were told "it's too late". Moreover, the Palestinian families and their supporters maintained that Ottoman documents that Israel's Supreme Court had validated were in fact forgeries, and that the original ruling and therefore evictions relating to that ruling should be reversed. The lawyer for the Israeli families emphasized that the land deeds were authentic, according to many Israeli courts. The Israeli court decision (resulting in the aforementioned evictions) stated that the document presented by the Palestinian families was a forgery, while the document of Jewish ownership was authentic.

43 Palestinians were evicted in 2002, the Hanoun and Ghawi families in 2008, and the Shamasneh family in 2017. In 2010, the Supreme Court of Israel rejected an appeal by Palestinian families who had lived in 57 housing units who had petitioned the court to have their ownership to the properties recognized. These petitioners refused to pay rent to the recognised owners and carried out construction on the properties unauthorized by those who the courts had recognized as the owners, and were evicted.

In August 2009, the al-Hanoun and al-Ghawi families were evicted from two homes in Sheikh Jarrah and Jewish families moved in after a Supreme Court ruling that the property was owned by Jews. The United Nations coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process, Robert Serry condemned the decision: "These actions heighten tensions and undermine international efforts to create conditions for fruitful negotiations to achieve peace." The US State Department called it a violation of Israel's obligations under the Road map for peace. Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said "Tonight, while these new settlers from abroad will be accommodating themselves and their belongings in these Palestinian houses, 19 newly homeless children will have nowhere to sleep." Yakir Segev of the Jerusalem municipal council responded: "This is a matter of the court. It is a civil dispute between Palestinian families and those of Israeli settlers, regarding who is the rightful owner of this property... Israeli law is the only law we are obliged to obey."

In 2021, Israel's Supreme Court had been expected to deliver a ruling on 10 May 2021 on whether to uphold the eviction of Palestinian families from the Sheikh Jarrah neighbourhood that had been permitted by a lower court. The order covers 13 families, 58 people including 17 children. Six families were to be evicted by 2 May, and a further 7 families by 1 August. In May 2021, clashes between Palestinians and Israeli police occurred over the anticipated evictions. On 9 May 2021, the Israeli Supreme Court delayed the expected decision on evictions for 30 days, after an intervention from Attorney General of Israel Avichai Mandelblit.

Reactions

Bernie Sanders argues that the Palestinian families subject to these eviction orders must navigate 'a legal system designed to facilitate their forced displacement.'