Police Quell Protest of Jewish Settlement in Arab Christian Quarter of Jerusalem

Police fired tear gas today to disperse Christian clerics, including the bishop of the Greek Orthodox Church, who protested the settlement of about 150 Jews in the Arab Christian Quarter of Jerusalem’s Old City.

Police moved in after one priest tore down a poster with an Israeli Star of David that had been put over a cross on the main door of a building taken over by the Jews, witnesses said.

The Jewish families, most of them headed by ultra-Orthodox seminary students, moved into a four-building complex in the heart of the Christian neighborhood Wednesday under police guard.

The site, near the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, was viewed as provocative by Palestinian Christians, as was the timing during Easter observances. It was the largest and most significant settlement of Jews outside the Jewish Quarter in the old, walled city.

Previously, two Jewish yeshiva seminaries were set up in the Muslim Quarter and about 40 Jewish families took up residence in the area, including former Israeli Defense Minister Ariel Sharon.

Jerusalem’s Old City, divided into ethnic quarters, is home to 50,000 Muslims, more than 7,000 Christians and about 4,000 Jews. It was controlled by Jordan from 1948 until 1967, when it was captured by Israel in the Six-Day War and immediately annexed.

Jews in the new settlement--named Neot David, which is Hebrew for Dwellings of David--told reporters today that their 72-room complex had been purchased legally from a Christian.

They said they were trying to re-establish the Jewish community that was driven from the area by Arab riots of 1936.

But their move caused stone-throwing protests by Palestinian youths and angry statements from city and religious leaders.

More than 200 clerics demonstrated outside the Greek Orthodox Church headquarters around the corner from the Jewish settlement and charged that the building had been illegally sold by a tenant.

“This is the property of the church. . . . The Jews took over this building. They made a contract in Geneva and bought it. I denounce this act,” said Greek Orthodox Patriarch Diodorus I.

Police said an investigation proved the purchase was legal.

Diodorus spoke after being overcome by tear gas and falling to the ground. He showed reporters a chain--broken in the melee--on one of the gold crosses he wears around his neck.

Christian merchants closed their shops in protest, and scattered bands of Arab youths were dispersed by tear gas when they threw stones at the Jewish complex and at police, witnesses said.