"FOR SALE: ARABS ONLY" IN JERUSALEM NEIGHBORHOOD

'For Sale: Arabs Only' in J'lem Neighborhood (INN)

Arabs living in Jerusalem's Pisgat Ze'ev neighborhood will only sell their homes to other Arabs, going so far as placing signs in the post-'67 Jewish neighborhood - named after Ze'ev Jabotinsky.

One sign, on a building at 15 Shlomo Street, reads: "For Sale/Rent to Arabs Only." Next door, at 17 Shlomo Street, lives the family of Sasson Nuriel, who was kidnapped and murdered by Hamas terrorists in September, 2005.

Sign on house on Shlomo Street in Pisgat Ze'ev: "For Sale/Rent to Arabs Only"
(Photo: Aryeh King)

Contacted by Arutz-7, the home's owner at first denied speaking or understanding Hebrew or English, though eventually admitted, in fluent Hebrew, that he had placed the sign. "In the State of Israel, Arabs and Jews live equally. We want to be equals and we can therefore sell the house to whoever we want," he said. He declined to give his name, but insisted that his right to sell to "Arabs only" would even stand up in court.

Aryeh King, who conducted a survey of Arabs moving into Jerusalem's Jewish neighborhoods due to the construction of the Partition Wall says at least 120 Arab families had moved into Pisgat Ze'ev as of December, 2006.

French Hill as well has become the new home of hundreds of Arabs from Ramallah-area villages such as A-Ram and Hizme. "They lived there because it was cheaper and they could travel freely through checkpoints with Israeli ID cards," King says. "Now they are concerned that the wall will keep them from entering Jerusalem, so there is a migration."

Families from Abu Dis and the Bethlehem area have been settling in the Armon HaNetziv neighborhood as well, King says.

In 2000, Israel's Supreme Court required the Jewish town of Katzir, in the Galilee, to allow Muslim Arabs to move in and build their homes there, ruling that limiting who can purchase land there would constitute discrimination.