Palestinian Families Urge US To Cancel Al-Quds Embassy Plans on Stolen Land

By Staff, MEE

Two rights groups have called on the United States to immediately cancel plans to build a new embassy and diplomatic compound in pccupied al-Quds on a land that was confiscated from Palestinian families, including several who are US citizens.

The call was made in a letter written by Adalah and the Center for Constitutional Rights [CCR] on behalf of the Palestinian families and sent on Thursday to US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken and US Ambassador to the occupied territories Thomas Nides.

"Should the US proceed with this plan, it would not only be complicit with ‘Israel's’ illegal confiscation of Palestinian-owned land, but it would also become an active participant in the seizure of the land of US citizens," the organizations wrote.

In February 2021, the US State Department and the so-called ‘Israel’ Land Authority submitted plans for a US diplomatic compound, following former US President Donald Trump's highly controversial May 2018 decision to unilaterally recognize occupied al-Quds as the Zionist entity’s so-called ‘capital’ and move the American embassy from Tel Aviv.

Earlier this week, the plans were made open for a 60-day public comment period after which a final decision on the project will be made.

In the 45-page letter, the two groups attached rental contracts between British Mandate authorities and Palestinian families who temporarily leased their land, which then made up part of the Allenby Barracks military base.

The land was confiscated by the Zionist government under the Absentees' Property ‘Law,’ which grants the entity the power to confiscate and impound Palestinian properties and assets that they were forced to leave behind during the Nakba.

The Nakba, or "the catastrophe", is the name Palestinians give to the massacres and forced expulsion they endured at the hands of Zionist militias in 1948, which left an estimated 15,000 indigenous Palestinians dead and some 750,000 displaced.

If the complex moves forward, Adalah and CCR said in the letter, it will be built "on land seized from Palestinians in violation of international law."