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JERUSALEM (Ma'an) -- Israeli forces demolished a residential building in the al-Tur neighborhood of Jerusalem on Monday on the pretext that it was built without a permit.

Members of the Ghazzawi family, who own the building, told Ma'an that Israeli soldiers escorted bulldozers to the area and began tearing down the building.

Family members were not given any time to remove their belongings.

Tawfiq Ghazzawi said the two-story building was built in 1997 and contained two apartments, one for him and his mother and another for his brother, Ayid.

The family have already paid fines of over 200,000 shekels ($57,126) and have been refused a construction permit several times by Israel's Jerusalem municipality.

Israel rarely grants Palestinians permits to build in the West Bank, including East Jerusalem. It has demolished at least 27,000 Palestinian homes and structures since occupying the West Bank in 1967, according to the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions.

The internationally recognized Palestinian territories of which the West Bank and East Jerusalem form a part have been occupied by the Israeli military since 1967.