On November 10, 2014, the prime minister issued orders to take the necessary actions for the demolition of the family homes of four alledged East Jerusalem assailants in fatal attacks in the city. On that day, Home Front Command officials arrived at the four houses and took photos and measurements. So far, only two have been served with demolition orders: the family of the man from 'Jabal al-Mukabber who killed a pedestrian when he ran him over with the tractor he was driving was served with a demolition order on November 13, 2014, and the family of the man from Silwan, suspected of perpetrating another vehicular attack, was served with an order on November 14, 2014. The families were given 48 hours to appeal the decision to the GOC Home Front Command.
According to the media, the prime minister has also issued instructions to demolish the homes of the two assailants in the stabbing attacks in Tel Aviv and Gush Etzion. One home is in Hebron and the other is in the ‘Askar refugee camp in the Nablus district.
In the past,
Israel systematically demolished homes in the West Bank, but this policy was abandoned almost entirely in 2005, after a military commission of inquiry found that the policy failed to achieve its target and rather than acting as a deterrent, it did the opposite. The last time East Jerusalem homes were demolished for punitive purposes was in 2009, when the military demolished the home of the first man to perpetrate an attack using a tractor, and sealed the apartment that had been occupied by the man who perpetrated the attack at Merkaz Harav yeshiva.
In June 2014, the Government of Israel declared its intent to employ a number of sanctions, including house demolitions, against the Palestinian population in the West Bank, in response to the abduction of three Israeli youths. Shortly thereafter, the military demolished four homes in Hebron: the
apartment of a person suspected of carrying out a shooting attack and the
homes of the three suspects in the abduction. At the same time,
Israeli daily Haaretz reported that the military was preparing to demolish dozens more homes in the West Bank, but security officials
said that the power to demolish homes would be exercised only in cases defined “extremely severe”. It now appears that rather than a pinpointed measure in specific cases, full-scale use of the unacceptable house demolition policy has resumed.
On the night of November 19, 2014, Israeli authorities detonated the apartment of the suspect in the vehicular attack; the apartment is on the 4th floor of a 5 floor apartment building in Silwan. The family, having no faith in the Israeli Justice system, declined to appeal against the intended demolition or to petition the HCJ.
