Candidates for city council clash during raucous east Jerusalem tour

By ETGAR LEFKOVITS
A tour of Arab neighborhoods in east Jerusalem on Monday with candidates for city council from the Right and Left of the political spectrum erupted into a boisterous shouting match between organizers and hawkish participants over differing political views on the future of the city. The event, which took place just 10 days before municipal elections was initiated by an Israeli watchdog group, Ir Amim, that advocates Palestinian rights in the city. The aim of the tour was to highlight basic infrastructure needs of the 250,000 Arabs residents in east Jerusalem. All eight city council candidates on the Ir Amim tour were united in their belief that Israel needs to provide equal services to both Jewish and Arab residents of the city, and to acknowledge that the Arab neighborhoods of east Jerusalem lag far behind Jewish sections of the city in municipal services. "As someone who supports keeping Jerusalem united, I believe it is our obligation to provide equal services to residents of eastern and western Jerusalem as one," said Elisha Peleg, who heads the Likud's city council list. Nevertheless, the late-morning tour was fraught with vociferous disputes and blistering disagreements over continued Israeli control of east Jerusalem. Peleg, an attorney who served on the Likud's city council list for a decade in the 1990s, fired the opening volley in the first minutes of the two-hour long tour when he asked organizers at the start of the event why their group did not deal with issues in western Jerusalem, and if the houses of recent Arab attackers were included on the tour of east Jerusalem. "If this isn't fitting for you, you can get off at the next stop," responded Sarah Kreimer, associate director of Ir Amim, an organization which advocates dividing Jerusalem between Israelis and Palestinians and which deals exclusively with the needs of Arabs in east Jerusalem. Kreimer said it was a "bad situation" for everyone that the Arab residents of east Jerusalem get only 10 percent of the municipal budget. She added that Israel withholds building permits for Arab residents in order to maintain a 70-30 ratio of Jews to Arabs in the city. Kreimer's efforts to explain the situation were not welcomed by the touring right-wing politicians. "This is a brainwashing tour of how poor the Arabs are and how Israel is the guilty one," Peleg said. "Elisha, this is not a Likud tour of east Jerusalem," event organizers shouted back. This was followed by Meir Deutsch, a newcomer on the National Religious Party-National Union city list, asking why organizers kept referring to Arab residents of east Jerusalem as Palestinians, triggering a whole new debate. The dispute only heightened when the bus arrived at its first stop in the east Jerusalem neighborhood of Tzur Bahir, where the group met with a local Arab activist. "Tell me, why don't you condemn terror attacks?" the right-wing city council candidates asked, as local TV cameras rolled. "Let us explore the reasons for the violence," the activist, Fouad Abu-Hamed said, adding that he experienced Israeli discrimination and racism on a daily basis. "Are you justifying violence?" Deutsch asked. "Did you condemn the settlers when they used violence?" interjected the Green Party's mayoral candidate Dan Biron. "Why don't you run in the municipal elections if you care to help your fellow-residents?" the hawkish councilors asked Abu-Hamed. Arab residents of Jerusalem boycott the municipal election since they do not recognize Israeli sovereignty over the city. "In the end, Jerusalem will return to the Palestinians," Abu-Hamed said. "We will see that that doesn't happen," Peleg replied. Then, as the bus drove past the house of the east Jerusalem Arab who carried out one of this year's Jerusalem attacks, the National Union-NRP members asked the bus to slow down so people could see if the site was still being commemorated by locals, prompting an immediate commotion. At the last stop of the tour in the east Jerusalem neighborhood of Silwan, the city councilor candidates were told by Israeli Arab attorney Sami Ershied, an Ir Amim member who represents Arab residents of the city, that as many as half of the residents of east Jerusalem have a criminal record due to building violations. Palestinians and left-wing Israelis routinely complain it is difficult for Arabs to obtain building permits in Jerusalem which forces them to build illegally. The municipality insists it is evenhanded in enforcing building codes in all parts of the city. Despite the heated debate - which was expected so close to an election with participants holding such opposing political views - the tour ended amicably, but it was clear that neither side, despite some agreement, was willing to budge on their core beliefs.