Israel’s Ongoing Annexation of East Jerusalem: Oppressing Palestinian National Sentiments Before and After October 7

After October 7, 2023, political and social crises have been observed throughout Palestine/Israel. For the Palestinians in East Jerusalem, who have been living for more than five decades with precarious residency permits granted by the Israeli government, one of the grave difficulties has been the serious violation of their freedom of expression and thought. Any of their statements deemed as critical of Israel’s ongoing war has widely been suppressed on the grounds of “incitement to terrorism.” However, this situation can hardly be seen as something entirely new; Palestinians in East Jerusalem have long faced some form of restriction on their freedom of expression in the context of Israel’s intensified anti-terrorist policies since the 2010s. Now, more than ever, in the wake of the unprecedented Hamas onslaught and the social unrest in Israel, the content of speech and ideas subject to regulation has become viciously vague and arbitrary, resulting in widespread suppression of Palestinian national sentiment. This plight should be seen in the context of Israel’s decades-long annexation of East Jerusalem, given the fact that the right-wing governments in recent years have accelerated efforts to achieve the unification of the city under Israeli rule and to establish Jerusalem as the undisputed core of the Jewish state.