Veteran Jerusalem activist Aryeh King visited the scene and took pictures showing new work and new construction materials that had been brought in. Also brought in were Arab laborers from Judea and Samaria, who lacked work permits, King said.
“We are facing a nightmare that will all but deny Jews access to graves on the holiest and oldest Jewish cemetery in the world,” said Avrohom Lubinsky of the Committee for the Preservation of the Mount of Olives. He accused city officials of failing to enforce stop work orders.
Jeff Daube, head of the Israel office of the Zionist Organization of America (ZOA), termed the ongoing problem “an outrage.”
“We are so concerned about the legal status of three buildings in Migron and will make every effort to tear those down, and in the meantime the Arabs are permitted to continue to build illegally with impunity right next to what, outside the Maarat Hamachpelah [Tomb of the Patriarchs – ed.], is the holiest graveyard in Jewish history,” he told Arutz Sheva.