Save Lifta

Ruins of Palestinian village, Lifta.  It's a 2000-year-old village in Palestine.  After occupation the tragedy of Lifta is the summary of Nakba.  One of the wealthiest communities in Jerusalem region with one of the richest history, Lifta was reduced to ruins by Stern Gang and Irgun in 1947-48.  Presently it's inhabited by Zionist hippies and drug gangs.

Image Bokstigen

This is the Palestinian village, Lifta (لفتا‎ ), as it looks today, located 5 miles west of occupied West Jerusalem. Though Lifta was a uniquely beautiful village, what the Zionist invaders did to it wasn't unique. Like more than 400 Palestinian towns and villages, Lifta was forcibly depopulated and ethnically cleansed in 1948. Writes Swedish blog, Bokstigen, in an article on Arabic literature (translated from Swedish): "During Nakba 1948, the Palestinians of this village fled to safer places and since then the houses have remained empty and the owners have not been allowed to return to their homes." The famous Palestinian children's author, Taghreed al-Najjar, currently residing in Jordan, belongs to this village.

In December 1947, six Palestinians were gunned down by Zionist terror groups, Stern Gang and Irgun Zvai Leumi, in Lifta's coffee house. These two terrorist groups were commanded by Menachem Begin and Yitzhak Shamir, unforgettable names in World History of Terrorism !! Ethnic cleansing of Lifta began soon after the terror act in Lifta's coffee house. The village population was terrorized repeatedly to leave. Stern Gang and Irgun were organized and heavily armed. They were most active in the area west of Jerusalem where Lifta was located. The village was cut-off from the west and anyone trying to leave was killed. The villagers resisted but were defeated after ten hours of fighting. By February 1948, the village was completely emptied. Most of its inhabitants fled to West Bank and East Jerusalem. Many were killed. Stern Gang and Irgun became the masters of Lifta. They broke holes in the beautiful domed roofs so these homes would be uninhabitable if the residents returned.

Those old structures on overgrown hillsides still display remnants of Lifta's historical beauty. The distinctive cube-shaped houses were made of a rare natural material called the "special Jerusalem stone."

Israeli authorities have long been planning the demolition of Lifta's heritage. Sooner or later that disastrous plan is expected to be carried out. In the meantime the Israeli government has allowed gangs of Zionist drug addicts, hippies and squatters to takeover Lifta. These druggies have been purposely damaging the elegant architecture of the ancient homes to prevent the return of Lifta’s legitimate residents. Whenever the demolition plan proceeds, every remnant of Lifta's history will be wiped away and replaced with modern townhouses and villas.

In 1596 during the Ottoman era, the prosperous village of Lifta was in the district of Jerusalem with a population of nearly 400. Lifta was a very fertile agricultural spot that grew wheat, barley, olives, grapes with plenty of fruit orchards. In 1863 when the French archaeologist, Victor Guerin, visited Lifta, he literally fell in love with the place describing it as "the land with gardens of lemon trees, oranges, figs, pomegranates, alms and apricots." And today, as Lifta awaits demolition, it's filled with the stench of Zion hipps on dope.

In January 2011 the “Save Lifta” petition which attracted thousands of signatures from around the world sent an application to the World Monuments Fund (WMF) to include the Palestinian village of Lifta in its World Monuments Watch List. The 'Save Lifta' group worked very hard for this purpose ... but eventually to no avail. In October 2011 they received an email informing, “We regret that the Lifta Village was not selected for inclusion in the 2012 Watch.”

Images: Electronic Intifada: Ethnic cleansing Lifta village and World bodies must act now save Lifta