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Scenes. Source: Silwanic. Published by IMEMC News
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by IMEMC News
Oct 11, 2021

Israeli soldiers injured, Sunday, three Palestinians during a protest against the desecration of the historic Al-Yusufiya historic Islamic cemetery, and the bulldozing graves, to establish a public garden.

The Palestinian Red Crescent Society (PRCS) said the soldiers injured three Palestinians, including one of its medics, after shooting them with concussion grenades.

The incident took place when dozens of Palestinians gathered in and around the graveyard to protest its ongoing desecration, especially after the Israeli bulldozers removed and scattered the bones in one of the graves.

Hajj Mustafa Abu Zahra, the head of the Islamic Cemeteries Committee in Jerusalem, said the soldiers bulldozed sections of the al-Yousifiyya graveyard near the Al-Aqsa Mosque and added that the bulldozers dug into a grave and exposed the skeletal remains of one of the graves.

Abu Zahra added that the Palestinians then managed to remove the Israeli bulldozers, and reburied the bones in the grave.

Dozens of Palestinians gathered in the area and started chanting against the desecration of graves and holy sites, and condemned the ongoing Israeli attempts to change the historic and demographic nature of occupied Jerusalem.

Last month, the army destroyed parts of the same cemetery, including the destruction of its wall and staircase, in addition to a similar violation in December 2020.

It is worth mentioning that the cemetery also contains the graves of Jordanian and Iraqi soldiers, who were killed by the Israeli army in the year 1967.

During Sunday’s attack by the Israeli soldiers, the bulldozers also destroyed a wall leading to Bab al-Asbat Gate.

In the year 2004, the Israeli authorities prevented the Palestinians from burying their dead in the northern part of the cemetery, as part of the constant work to establish what Israel calls a “National Garden,” and removed the remains of twenty Jordanian soldiers who were killed in 1967.
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Palestinians Rebury The Bones After Israeli Bulldozers Desecrated Graves In Jerusalem

by IMEMC News
Oct 12, 2021

Many Palestinians reburied, on Monday evening, the skulls and bones in a Muslim cemetery in occupied Jerusalem, after Israeli bulldozers desecrated their graves in the historic Al-Yusufiya historic Islamic cemetery.

Sheikh Omar al-Kiswani, the director of the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem, described the Israeli attack against the graveyard as a serious violation and added that the Israeli bulldozers did not only uncover the skulls and bones of the dead but also smashed and broke many of them.

“It is our moral and religious duty to rebury the dead in an official burial ceremony,” he said, “We must protect our dead, our sacred sites, but we aren’t surprised by this serious violation, as such Israeli violations are not new. Israel is desecrating the graves in front of the whole world, encouraged by international silence and indifference.”

Attorney Hamza Qteina said that he submitted an urgent appeal with the Israeli court in Jerusalem demanding halting the digging and desecration of graves, especially since the City Council in occupied Jerusalem is claiming that the work is only meant to establishing a “National Garden,” without digging and desecrating graves.

Qteina described the desecration of old Islamic graves as a serious violation, and a crime targeting the dead and the history of the holy city.

The latest dissertation took place on Sunday when Israeli bulldozers dugs graves to establish a so-called “national garden”, and the army injured three Palestinians, including a medic.