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Jerusalemites will be the ones to pay the price for Trump's decision Articles/ Op-Eds

Ir Amim’s Executive Director, Yudith Oppenheimer: “One can make vain declarations that annul the Palestinian connection to Jerusalem, but it is impossible to uproot Jerusalem from their hearts, or to uproot them from their city. Jerusalem was and will continue to be the home of two peoples.”

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No difference between the Right and the Zionist Union on Jerusalem? Articles/ Op-Eds

Yudith Oppenheimer, Executive Director of Ir Amim: “The difference between the right-wing and Zionist Union plans is smaller than one might think. Both advocate unilaterally uprooting Palestinian neighborhoods from Jerusalem and imprisoning them in enclaves that are completely disconnected, where residents’ living conditions will deteriorate even further… No party stands to gain from further harm inflicted upon the residents of east Jerusalem within or outside the Separation Barrier.”

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Don’t mess with Jerusalem Articles/ Op-Eds

Ir Amim Board member Naomi Chazan: “Two interrelated bills… if adopted, will fundamentally redraw the contours of the city and the composition of its inhabitants in Israel’s 70th year. Together, they will create a massive Jerusalem metropolis under Israeli sovereignty, transform the character of the city, further bifurcate the West Bank, and sound the death knell for any possibility of an Israeli-Palestinian accord.”

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Increasing Cooperation between the Temple Movements and the Israel Police Policy Papers

Over the past year, the Temple movement has refocused its agenda, prioritizing the goal of increasing the number of Jewish visitors to the Temple Mount/Haram al-Sharif. Much of the movement’s success stems from a demonstrative change in the attitude of the Israel Police toward its activities. Over the years, as part of their scope of responsibilities to prevent disturbances within the sensitive compound, and in response to Temple activists’ repeated violations of their instructions, the police have imposed various restrictions on activists’ entry to the Temple Mount/Haram al-Sharif. In the past year, not only have they lifted some of these restrictions, the police have actually been working in close coordination with Temple activists. This deepening of relations leads to a clear erosion of the status quo and may rekindle confrontations on the Mount/Haram. As will be explored in this document, it appears that the root of this provocative change in police conduct is the minister of public security himself, Gilad Erdan.

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Hundreds of Jewish Teens Run Riot in Muslim Part of Jerusalem's Old City In the Media

Ir Amim said: "This is not the first time that the police have not done their job to protect the Palestinian residents of East Jerusalem." The NGO added that the police had attempted to hide the nature of the incident when it described the incident in its statement as a fight between groups of youths, and not as an attack on Palestinians and their property.

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Jewish worshippers in Jerusalem attack Arab-owned shop In the Media

Ir Amim criticized the police for not taking action during the attack on a Palestinian shop owner. “This is not the first time that the police is not doing its job to protect the Palestinian residents of east Jerusalem,” the NGO said in a statement. “If that is not enough, it added another wrongdoing by hurrying to put out a statement that hides the truth from the public about the assaulting of Palestinians.”

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Law but no justice in Sheikh Jarrah Articles/ Op-Eds

Oren Haber: "While the proceedings that led to the latest eviction in Sheikh Jarrah were lawful, were they just? Or perhaps our eyes have become blind to injustice, our hearts immune to outrage. This brand of injustice will bring neither stability to Jerusalem in the short term nor peace to the city in the long term."

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Education Report 2017: Fifty Years of Neglect Reports

In recent years, the school system in East Jerusalem has been coping with a continued shortage of classrooms as well as the highest dropout rates recorded in data collected by Israel; while at the same time confronting the considerable stress being exerted, mainly by the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Jerusalem Affairs, to impose the Israeli curriculum on the Palestinian national community in the city. The combination of neglected infrastructure and elaborate political attempts to influence content has left the school system in East Jerusalem in dire straits. Along with mounting pressure from the Israeli government, the disparities reviewed in this report have serious ramifications for tens of thousands of Palestinian children in East Jerusalem.

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How the world missed a week of Palestinian civil disobedience In the Media

Interview with Ir Amim’s Aviv Tatarsky about the delicate status quo at the Temple Mount, the possibility of bringing an end to the violence, and the media’s unwillingness to cover Palestinian nonviolence.

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Everything you need to know about tensions at Jerusalem's holiest site Articles/ Op-Eds

Over the last week a series of escalating events on the Temple Mount/Haram al-Sharif has threatened peace and security at the holy site and for Jerusalem as a whole. Ir Amim has created the following primer to help make sense of these rapidly spiraling events and to raise the call for a swift, agreed resolution of the current conflict.

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Western Wall crisis transcends Israel-Diaspora relations Articles/ Op-Eds

Ir Amim's Betty Herschman: “For decades, the state has empowered settler groups to dispossess Palestinians of their land and homes. Now that power is being wielded against Reform and onservative Jews, further driving a wedge between the Israeli and Diaspora Jewish communities. To help bridge that gulf, we must not only fight together for religious pluralism in Israel but also against the government’s empowerment of settlers who are steadily gaining ground at the Western Wall, throughout the Old City in which it is centered and in the entire ring of Palestinian neighborhoods around its perimeter.”

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Reform Judaism’s true mission at the Western Wall Articles/ Op-Eds

Ir Amim Executive Director: "Reform Jewry can and should play an important role in leading a pluralistic religious discourse grounded in principles of social and gender justice and tikkun olam. Such a discourse would recognize the importance of the Western Wall in Jewish tradition and identity, while at the same time treating the site within the context of the larger political reality in which it is centered."

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Unilateral Separation Plans for Jerusalem Are Back Articles/ Op-Eds

Oren Haber: Unilaterally severing neighborhoods from East Jerusalem is both inhumane and impractical, and it stands to thwart any progress toward a political resolution on the city, rather than promoting it.

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East Jerusalem hit by wave of home demolitions Articles/ Op-Eds

Aviv Tatarsky: “the maliciousness of the demolition policy in al-Walaja, East Jerusalem and Area C is unmistakable. Thousands have been made homeless by demolitions in the last two years, with the underlying goal of expelling the Palestinian population to the Area A and B enclaves throughout the West Bank.”

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Renewed Work on Separation Barrier to Cut Palestinian Villagers From Their Lands In the Media

“The completion of the fence is proceeding in parallel with the development of the national park, on beautiful agricultural land which the fence will cut off from the village,” said Ir Amim’s Aviv Tatarsky, “The sorry excuse claiming security considerations cannot hide the robbery and blatant wrongdoing.”

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Jerusalem mayor: City’s diverse residents ‘all my children’ In the Media

Ir Amim found in a 2014 report that the municipality allocated only an estimated 10 to 13 percent of its annual budget to east Jerusalem, even though Arab residents make up just over a third of the city’s population.

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Greater Jerusalem 2017 Maps

Map showing the Green Line and the municipal boundary; the distinction between I

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New legislation ups sanctions for illegal construction In the Media

Ir Amim reported a record 203 demolitions in East Jerusalem last year. Palestinians make up 37% of the city’s population, but only 15% of the area of East Jerusalem is zoned for Palestinian construction, it said.

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Settlement Around the Old City Maps

Map showing settlements and national parks surrounding the Old City area.

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How Israel Is Expanding Jerusalem to Neighboring Settlement In the Media

Ir Amim's Aviv Tatarsky: “The right wing is trying to whitewash the E1 project by claiming that Ma’aleh Adumim lies within the national consensus. Building there will convert Ma’aleh Adumim from an Israeli negotiating point which could be part of a land swap with the Palestinians into a death blow for the two-state solution. Investing billions in infrastructure there expresses a determination to foil such a solution."

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