Palestinian official: Qalandia Airport plan in Jerusalem aims to control 12% of West Bank lands

Salah Khawaja, an official in the Wall and Settlement Resistance Commission, warned of strategic dangers from a massive Israeli settlement project being established on the lands of the historic Qalandia Airport north of occupied Jerusalem.

Khawaja stated in remarks that the plan aims to change the features of the area and impose new realities on the ground as part of what is called the "Greater Jerusalem" project.

He explained that Qalandia Airport, which was a symbol of Palestinian sovereignty before the 1967 occupation, gradually transformed from a civilian airport into an Israeli military base, before becoming today a target for a settlement plan that includes the construction of about 9,000 housing units.

He clarified that the project aims to isolate Jerusalem from its Palestinian surroundings and displace dozens of Bedouin communities from the area.

The official in the Wall and Settlement Resistance Commission pointed out that this step will cut off geographical communication between the northern and southern West Bank, turning Palestinian villages into "closed cantons."

He added that the Israeli plan enjoys political consensus within both the occupation government and the opposition, and comes within the strategy of expanding settlements and linking them to the "Ma'ale Adumim" settlement, thereby strengthening Israeli control over approximately 12% of the West Bank lands.

Khawaja warned that the implementation of the project would lead to the "erasure of Qalandia's historical features," which included the fourth largest land area in the vicinity of Jerusalem and Ramallah, stressing that demolition operations in the area are accelerating rapidly, as part of a systematic displacement plan.

Yesterday, Monday, the Israeli District Planning and Building Committee in Jerusalem postponed to a later session the approval of a settlement project targeting the lands of the former Jerusalem International Airport, which provides for the construction of approximately 9,000 settlement units north of Jerusalem on an area estimated at about 1243 dunams (a dunam equals one thousand square meters), constituting a huge colonial barrier that cuts off geographical communication between Jerusalem and Ramallah, and deals a devastating blow to the possibility of an independent Palestinian state with geographical contiguity.