Palestinian Turns Down $5 Million Offer to Vacate his House in Sheikh Jarrah: Report
Abdel-Fattah Eskafi is one among dozens of Palestinians who face threats being fired from his home and neighborhood, Anadolu Arabic reported.
Speaking to Anadolu, he said he will never bow down to pressures from Zionist settlers.
“My family has been displaced since 1948. We used to live in Baqa'a (on the outskirts of West Jerusalem) and we came to East Jerusalem. I currently live in my 130-square-meter house, with my family of 14 people, including my children and grandchildren,” he said.
He said their house in Baqa’a is still there but Zionist settlers now live there.
In 1972, he continued, settlers forged a paper and registered the land in the Israel Lands Administration, but we are sure that it is an illegal and forged paper.
They do not have any documents, and they presented a paper, but the team of lawyers defending us realized that the paper is not authentic, Eskafi said.
The Israeli Supreme Court offered Palestinian families to stay in their homes for 15 years in return for paying rent to settlers but Palestinian families rejected the offer as it meant accepting settlers’ ownership of the properties, he added.
Zionists continue harassment as well as offers to take Palestinians’ homes and lands since the 1970s, he said, noting that recently, he has received around $5 million bid for selling land in Al-Quds and two apartments which have been rejected by his family.
“We do not want this money. We will not sell our lands to them even if they pay money as much our weight. We are here and will never leave,” he stressed.
