Recently, the state renewed its promotion of a plan to build an ultra-Orthodox neighborhood of 9,000 housing units on the ruins of the abandoned Qalandiyah/Atarot Airport in northern Jerusalem, after the plan had been frozen for several years – mainly due to American pressure, as Nir Hasson reported in December. If built, this neighborhood – the first to rise beyond the Green Line in Jerusalem in years – would be closer to al-Manara Square in Ramallah than to Jerusalem’s Kikar Hashabbat.
