wfn.org | [PCUSANEWS] Anti-terror wall is ruining Jerusalem,

[PCUSA NEWS <PCUSA.NEWS@ECUNET.ORG>]

Note #8952 from PCUSA NEWS to PRESBYNEWS:

05539
Oct. 10, 2005

Anti-terror wall is ruining Jerusalem, 
according to Israeli think-tank study  
  
by Michele Green
Ecumenical News International	

JERUSALEM - A barrier of barbed-wire fences and concrete walls that Israel is
erecting through Arab neighborhoods is causing hardship to thousands and
diminishing Jerusalem's standing as a major city, according to a leading
Israeli think tank.  
  
	The Jerusalem Institute for Israel Studies last week released some
results of an in-depth examination of the impact of the controversial
barrier, which Israel began building three years ago.	
  
	Israel says the barrier, more than 600 kilometers long, is needed to
prevent suicide bombers from infiltrating its cities. About 75 kilometers
runs through Jerusalem, cutting outlying Arab neighborhoods off from the
city's holy sites and severing them from municipal facilities such as schools
and hospitals.	 
  
	The study found that, even if the barrier prevents terror attacks,
frustration and anger suffered by Jerusalem's Palestinians "may increase
hostility and undermine the fragile relationship between the Jewish and Arab
communities in the city."  
  
	The barrier also has separated large Palestinian districts from the
city. Residents of these areas must pass through checkpoints and obtain
permits to access religious sites only a short distance from their homes,
including the Church of the Holy Sepulchre and the al-Aqsa mosque compound.  
  
	The study found that the barrier also was damaging the city's
real-estate market, because tens of thousands of Palestinians who hold
Israeli residency status have found themselves on the wrong side of the
barrier and therefore have moved to other parts of the city unaffected by the
barrier, pushing up prices in these neighborhoods.

	"To a large extent, Jerusalem has changed from a central city
providing services to more than a million people ... to a peripheral town,"
the institute said in its report. "It is a limited metropolitan area that
serves only 20 per cent of the residents it formerly did, most of them Jews."
 
  
	The institute also predicts an exodus of the Jewish population
because of the barrier.

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