Over the past year, a thousand Palestinian inhabitants of East Jerusalem's Sheikh Jarrah Neighbourhood have become the target of an ongoing process of eviction and dispossession. A group of settlers sponsored by the notorious Irwing Moskowitz wants all of them to make place for a Jews-only compound that they intend to build around an ancient tomb attributed to Shimon Hatzadik (Simon the Righteous), a sage of the Third Century B.C. (*)

After a decades-long judicial battle, Israeli courts declared the settler association to be the legal owner on the basis of an obscure Ottoman land deed from before 1887 -- especially infuriating as Palestinian ownership of West Jerusalem houses left behind in 1948 have been declared null and void. Judges persist in regarding the issue as a simple civil case of "tenants refusing to pay rent to the owner", issuing eviction orders for house after house at the settlers' request, and refusing to discuss any wider issues.

A year ago the Al-Kurd family were the first to be thrown out of their Sheikh Jarrah house. The eviction by a 500-strong police force of an aged couple was blood curdling. Muhammad Al-Kurd had a heart attack during the brutal eviction, and died a few days later. The tent where his widow 'Oum Kamel' lived in front of what was her home was repeatedly torn down by the Jerusalem municipality -- and put up again. (As a protest, the tent was sometimes put up in front of the family's pre-48 West-Jerusalem home.)

Since then, however, about sixty of Oum Kamel's neighbours have joined her, living in an ever-growing tent city, and the streets of what had been a quiet middle class neighbourhood have become a place of tensions and violent clashes, patrolled day and night by grim-faced security guards armed with sub-machine guns. Israeli and international activists arrive daily to express solidarity, and larger protest events are called every few weeks. There are conventional demonstrations as well as unconventional events such as street parties, dancing on the street and music (both Arab and Western) well heard within the settler-occupied houses.

On such occasions, the settlers usually barricade themselves in their fortified enclave with the Israeli national flag on top of the stolen houses, and are not to be seen or heard. But when they sense an unguarded moment, they pounce again to grab yet another house. The latest -- a week ago, on Nov. 2, when they arrived with a court order to evict a family from half of their home (about the other half, a court hearing is scheduled for next February). Israeli peace activists soon arrived, blocking the settlers from throwing out the Palestinian family's belongings. International media arrived, as did diplomats who made no secret of their intention to compile reports for their governments.

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After several hours of a standoff, the police requested the settlers to vacate the building for ten days, "pending further clarifications." As we go to print, the Rabbis for Human Rights, who are deeply involved in this struggle, are coordinating a major new protest for when the ten days of grace will run out.

(*) Tel-Aviv-based activist Marcey Gayer remarks in her July ElectronicIntifada article: "Simon the Righteous is the one credited by legend as the originator of the beloved Jewish aphorism: 'On three things the world resides: on the Holy Law, on prayer, and on the performance of good deeds.' How can these people possibly think they are doing a good deed?"