Yom Jerusalem - By Yahal Porat
Yom Jerusalem - by Yahal Porat
Every year since 1967 we celebrate the re-unification of the holy city: Jerusalem, the eternal capital of the Jewish people, was freed or conquered by the IDF during the six days war. It was back then a very special time to the Jewish people and Israelis in particular. Many thought the success was more then a simple win in the battlefield. Many saw it as the hand of god intervening in reality. A few people dreamed that messiah is about to come to the city of god.
But as we all know, messiah was delayed (again) and Jerusalem has become a huge city, united under Israel’s law, with many unsolved issues to discuss. Today more then 700,000 people live in the city municipal area. Of them, less then 66% are Jews and therefore more then 34% are Arabs (mainly Muslims). Over 400,000 are living in the areas of Jerusalem that were not part of the city prior to 1967.
While many Israeli and Jews are celebrating the important day, one must have a bit of critique upon this: is it that good?
Well the simple answer is: No. Jerusalem is the second poorest city in Israel; Jerusalem is pretty much suffering with litter in streets and air pollution; the huge education system suffers difficulties; more and more young couples are living the city; and surprise-surprise, the city is actually divided.
In a very long but interesting article published by Neta Sela in Ynet -
(http://www.ynet.co.il/articles/0,7340,L-3244339,00.html), one can understand a bit about the issue of east-Jerusalem. This part of the city is the Arab one, and is still behind in every aspect. The roads are crooked, the buildings are old and so on.
Here are a few unbelievable facts about east-Jerusalem:
1 – in few northern neighbourhoods with population of about 75,000 people, there is only one mailman. He cannot of course deliver to everyone so he lives the mail in many central places such as supermarkets. People need to search for their own mail among the big pale of letters. That causes many difficulties: if you get a water bill for example, but it takes so many days, one can be late of paying. Calling to the water company is no worth cause they claim they did send the bill on time, so one get another fee to pay.
2 – in few neighbourhoods in eastern Jerusalem, such as tzur-baher, there is no swage system at all. 15,000 people are enjoying the great smell of it in the street. In another Arab village which is part of Jerusalem municipal area, Kfar-Akev, the villagers paid their own many to build a swage system, cause they couldn’t stand the smell.
3 – house demolishing: last year only. Almost 1000 houses were demolished in east-Jerusalem, due to illegal building. This is the outcome of a very frustrating bureaucracy process that takes 5 years before getting any permission if at all to build a new house.
4 – education: east-Jerusalem is the lowest place in Israel to have students who passed their a-levels exams, only 13.8% of students did that last year. Out of almost 80,000 school age kids, about 15,000 are not even attending school at all, mainly because lack of classrooms. Few schools decided to teach in two shifts: first is 8-12, second is 12:30-4 or so. Other schools are operating in residential buildings; so 35 pupils are sitting in a room that originally was to be a bedroom. Just imagine.
5 – the people of east-Jerusalem travel their own public transportation, different then the west side one; they use different offices of governmental services or health services. Usually they have to wait much longer in lines to get those services. The water and electricity supplies are made by companies that are not Israelis, one of them based in Rammala.
Of course many of the issues are not that simple as described by Sela. But the general idea is that Jerusalem is still divided, and that the council of Jerusalem as the government of Israel are not doing enough to give equal budgets and opportunities to the Arab citizens, who are by law considered to be Israeli citizens.
So is it what we dream about when we say the eternal city? What can we do about it? How?
For more info:
http://www.jiis.org.il/
www.jerusalem.muni.il/
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/vie/Jerusalem1.html
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