Details and pictures- Evicting a tenant in Silwan after the owner sold the property in twisted ways
On Wednesday morning, Israeli occupation forces raided the apartment of Jawad Abu Sneineh in the neighborhood of Batn Al-Hawa, in Silwan, to evict them from the apartment and hand it over to the settlers after it was sold to them by its original owner Jamal Sarhan.
Wadi Hilweh Information Center reported that the Israeli occupation forces raided Batn Al-Hawa neighborhood in Silwan in large numbers, and got stationed in Al-Ein Street and closed the streets and roads. Afterwards, they raided the apartmentof Jawad Abu Sneineh and proceeded to empty the contents after the family members were detained. This comes after the decision of the "Israeli Procedures Department" earlier this month to evict the apartmentin favor of the "Ateret Cohnim" settlement association, after they purchased it in August 2015 from its original owner, "Jamal Sarhan."
The center added that the apartmentis located within a large 5-storey residential building that was completely handed over to the settlers in 2015, except for Abu Sneineh's apartment, which does not exceed 80 square meters, where he renewed the lease of the house with Jamal Sarhan before the infiltration and handing over to the settlers. Jawad refused to leave his residence and tried to protect it during the past years despite the harassment and temptations to get out of it.
Jawad Abu Sneineh, who is deported from Jerusalem, said that the settlers' lawyers had offered the family several times during the past years to leave the apartment in return for an "Israeli identity" and to provide work and housing for us, but we refused. Two weeks ago, in an attempt to pressure the family, Jawad was arrested on the pretext of "illegal presence in Jerusalem" and sentenced to three months' imprisonment and denied entry to the city. During that time, the soldiers frequently raided the apartment and searched it to harass the family.
The suffering of the family of Jawad Abu Sneineh did not stop at the decision to evacuate them, but the settlers living in the same building deliberately harassed the family from the first days of the seizure, cutting off the water from the apartment, destroying the television satellite and other provocative daily practices that the family resisted while refusing to evacuate.
The family of Jawad Abu Sneineh consists of 11 people, half of whom are under the age of 18, and are now homeless after handing over their residence to the settlers.
The information center said that the Israeli occupation forces arrested Khaled Al-Zeer while filming the evacuation of the apartment of the family of Abu Sneineh, and arrested a member of the committee of Batn Al-Hawa, Jadallah Rajabi, after summoning him for interrogation.
Batn Al-Hawa Committee explained that the occupation authorities evacuated Jawad Abu Sneineh from his apartment, despite a case in the Israeli courts filed by the Sarhan family against "Jamal Sarhan" in an attempt to recover the property confiscated, as the ownership of the property was to Jamal’s father, and therefor Jamal is not entitled to buy and sell. The case is still in the courts and the decision was postponed while keeping everything as is, that is, the building is for the settlers except for the apartment inhabited by Abu Sneineh family.
