Summary
The tramway project connecting West Jerusalem to the colonies in and around occupied East Jerusalem, the subject of Chapter 11 of Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions, which argues its route reveals an objective to irreversibly entrench the Judaization of Jerusalem (Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions: The Global Struggle for Palestinian Rights, PDF p.151-164).
Details
- Its official brochure presents it as fulfilling Theodor Herzl’s vision of Jerusalem: “modern neighborhoods with electric lines, tree-lined boulevards … a metropolis of the 20th century” (PDF p.151-152).
- The routes predominantly serve the colonies of Atarot Airport, Neve Ya’kov, Pisgat Ze’ev, Ramot, the Har Ha-Tzofim campus of Hebrew University, and Gilo; the project is the brainchild of the Jerusalem Transportation Master Plan, administered by the Ministry of Transport and the Jerusalem Municipality (PDF p.153).
- The legal case as the chapter presents it: infrastructure serving the colonies is illegal by extension of the Fourth Geneva Convention, UN resolutions and the ICJ’s July 9, 2004 opinion; the project “may amount to a war crime” and participating companies, Veolia and Alstom, can be regarded as “aiding and abetting” (PDF p.153-154).
- Harms recorded: 2,000 square meters of a Shuafat resident’s land confiscated, a 15-shekel ticket against a 4-shekel bus fare, a jobs requirement of “full military/civic service”, and CityPass’s position that the two populations “will not meet on the train, because of their different life patterns” (PDF p.161-162).
Related pages
Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions: The Global Struggle for Palestinian Rights, Veolia, Alstom, Judaization, BDS movement