Just how badly has the security situation deteriorated in Israel's capital amid the "silent intifada" that has been spiraling out of control in recent months?
Arutz Sheva spent some time with Avishag Ganot, a resident of the Jewish neighborhood of Kidmat Tzion located in eastern Jerusalem adjacent to Abu Dis, who needs an accompanying car and armed guard just to pick her children up from kindergarten each day.
The neighborhood just last month celebrated ten years since its founding, in a celebration that featured mizrahi ("oriental") music superstar Kobi Peretz and popular Kiryat Arba singer Udi Davidi - but the daily life in an area near Abu Dis where terrorists march freely is more flash-point than flashy.
"I bring my kids and pick them up every day from a kindergarten in Ma'ale Hazeitim (on the Mount of Olives - ed.) which is a five minute drive from Kidmat Tzion," said Ganot. "In the morning it's more calm and I bravely take them even in my car, but in the afternoon hours when young Arabs aren't in school anymore we get hit with rocks. A day when we don't get rocks on the car is a miracle."
When asked if she doesn't feel that she's endangering her children, Ganot simply responds "that's Jerusalem."
"This is Jewish property that was bought in the 1920s. We receive full municipal services from the Jerusalem Municipality," says Ganot. She questions "to put the border of Jerusalem at the Western Wall? If so, maybe we shouldn't go to Ammunition Hill either, there too Arabs wander around."
As Arutz Sheva accompanied Ganot on her way to Kidmat Tzion, the car passed a home belonging to an Arab family, and Ganot's children waved hello.
"When my children are asked who lives in Kidmat Tzion they also include this Arab family. They are friends, we were at their home a few times for a cup of coffee. My little daughter, Halel, asked me 'are Anan and Razan not bad Arabs?' And I tell her that yes, not all are bad Arabs, it's just a small part that make problems," Ganot says.
Stopping the Jerusalem "disengagement"?
With a housing freeze on Jewish construction in eastern Jerusalem that recently renewed plans of a small-scale have not assuaged, a lack of enforcement against the 40,000 illegal Arab housing units in the capital that grow at a rate of 800 units a year, and large building projects for Arab residents, it has been charged that Jerusalem is the subject of a de facto division.
Speaking about the building plans for the neighborhood that have yet to be realized, Ganot noted "we don't determine the borders of Jerusalem. Today there's a plan in the regional committee of the Jerusalem Municipality to build in Kidmat Tzion 350 housing units in stage one, and another 500 housing units in stage two."
Asked whether she feels that she is a sort of emissary in stopping the division of the capital, Ganot said "we are trying to build another neighborhood in Jerusalem, I don't know what I'm stopping."
"When the land in Beit Hakerem (in western Jerusalem) was bought here too the land was purchased by Jews," recalled Ganot. "It's true that now there are six families living her, but I believe that in the end a neighborhood that is an indivisible part of Jerusalem will rise here."
In that struggle to make Kidmat Tzion an integral piece of the capital, Jerusalem Councilman Arieh King in March pushed through a new Egged bus line bound for Kidmat Tzion, so as to further strengthen the Jewish presence there.