Locals Protest Israeli Road Dividing East Jerusalem Village
Residents of the east Jerusalem neighborhood of Beit Safafa are protesting Israeli plans to build a highway through the heart of their village, Jillian Kestler-D'Amours reports.
BEIT SAFAFA, EAST JERUSALEM — Shouting “No, no, no to Road 4” and walking hand in hand, hundreds of Palestinian children, men and women poured into a fenced-in Israeli construction site in Beit Safafa Sunday, Feb. 10 in protest of an Israeli roadway residents say will destroy their village.
“Everything is going to be changed. It’s not going to be the same Beit Safafa I know, so of course I’m going to be against it because it’s not logical,” said 25-year-old resident and protest organizer Duaa Subhi. “It will be like the separation wall in the West Bank, but inside the village.”
The Jerusalem municipality plans to build a six-lane highway — known as both Road 4 and the Begin Highway — through the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Beit Safafa. The road would effectively divide the village into two parts and cut residents off from shops, the mosque, schools and most importantly, each other.
“They are planning to finish this street by the end of the year. Every day we can see trucks passing. They are creating huge traffic inside the village,” Subhi told Al-Monitor, in front of a protest tent that has been erected against the road. “Lots of kids have problems getting to school. Even the streets are dirty because of the trucks that are moving all the time. [There is] noise of the building and the construction.”
