21.01.2011                     16.Shevat, 5771

Wiederaufbau:

Israel moves to turn deserted Palestinian village into luxury housing project

Israelis and Palestinians dedicated to the village Lifta's preservation have called the plan to build 212 luxury units and a small hotel the end for the last Arab village of its kind.

Yakub Odeh, 67, walks among the ruins of the Arab village of Lifta at the entrance to Jerusalem and is oblivious to the new neighborhoods and freeways that surround it. He doesn't see the train tunnel being dug above it or the secret escape route for the country's leaders being dug below.
Odeh doesn't see the "Death to the Arabs" graffiti at the entrance to the village or the Arabic version of the name that someone blotted out on the sign there. He sees a village and an area as it existed until March 1948, before it was abandoned by its Palestinian residents….