Arnona Tax a Sword on the Necks of Jerusalemites

Israel un/officially promotes a policy of human judaization in Jerusalem continuously creating new forms of pressure to push Palestinians to migrate from the city and encourage the presence of a Jewish majority. One such example is the Tax of Arnona, an excise tax imposed on property-owning Palestinians in the city.

After Israel occupied East Jerusalem in 1967, the state imposed this municipal property tax, ^[2]which forces Palestinian merchants in East Jerusalem to pay 280 shekels per square meter of property owned annually and residents to pay anywhere from 50 to 120 shekels per square meter of their area of residence.^[3]

The Arnona Tax is considered to be the biggest threat to Palestinian residents of occupied Jerusalem,^[4]. and according to a study conducted by the Jerusalem Center for Social and Economic Rights, the Arnona tax is also discriminatory and unjust for a number of reasons including:^[5]ts legal basists criteria of collection, the level of taxation, the implementation of its regulations, the resultant imposed on those who are unable to meet its requirements, and the ; services offered to Palestinians in return to paying Arnona.

Types of Arnona:

The Arnona tax affects two primary properties, residential properties and business properties.:^[6]

1. Residential Taxes:

The tax on residential properties depends on many factors none of which include the level of income. Residential taxes vary and are usually determined on the location of the neighborhood, the size and area of the residency, as well as the quality of construction and current state of the dwelling.

This tax often exceeds low income of Arab families and reach record highs in East Jerusalem particularly since larger homes were often designed that way not for luxury but to accommodate large families and extended family members.

2. Business Taxes:

Taxes on businesses also are based on the size of the commercial property owned and not the amount of commercial activity it brings or the income it provides..

The Effects of the Arnona tax on Palestinian Existence in Jerusalem

This tax threatens Palestinian existence in Jerusalem because many palestinians cannot pay the exorbitant tax and are often forced to close their shops and their means of income, which in turn means they cannot afford to maintain a living in the city or pay the taxes imposed on their homes–effectively pushing them and their families out of the city. .^[7]

70% of Palestinian residents in Jerusalem live below the poverty line^[8] as 70-80% of Palestinian Jerusalemites owe the Israeli Municipality unpaid Arnona taxes. The municipality files cases against them and imposes punitive measures that vary from more fines to the seizure of property and even imprisonment. In some cases, the business property or real estate belonging to Palestinians who are unable to pay the Arnona tax are sold in auctions that favor Jewish settlers and which result in the replacement of Arabs by Jews in the city..^[9]

Only 12% of the Arnona tax money benefits Palestinians in East Jerusalem in the form of services^[10] while the rest is given to new settlers to help build and open businesses in Jerusalem and around it.^[11]

Palestinians are essentially forced to raise money for the settlers who will almost inevitably seize their properties. By 2000, 250 shops of 1000 shops in the old city had to shut down due to the accumulation of Arnona taxes that went unpaid and which, along with other taxes on the properties, had reached$8500 per 100 meters of business property in East Jerusalem. By 1990, the average Arnona tax average per Palestinian had reached $20,000. To the present day, the Palestinian business sector in the city owes the Israeli municipality 1,500,000 shekels, or approximately half a million dollars in Arnona taxes.^[12] Of course, this not only weakens the Palestinian economy in the city–it also encourages Palestinian migration from the city in favor of settler expansion in no subtle way.