The popular Al-Shu’ala grill restaurant – whose name means “The Flame” – on Salah al-Din Street in East Jerusalem was closed on Wednesday for seven days under an administrative order issued by the deputy commander of the Israel Police’s Jerusalem District. The order followed the employment of an undocumented Palestinian resident of the West Bank. This is not the first time such a worker has been found at the restaurant, which has previously been shut down twice for similar reasons. The brief closures and relatively low fines imposed on the business appear to have failed to deter its owners, who have repeatedly returned to the same conduct.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In the grounds for the closure order, Jerusalem District Deputy Commander Brigadier General Ronen Ovadia, who signed the document, noted that considerable weight was given to the state of war in which Israel has found itself since October 7, 2023. He also determined that the version provided by the owner during questioning did not fully correspond with the investigative material and that there was concern the premises could again be used to violate Israel’s Entry Law.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In a statement, the Jerusalem District Police noted: “The Jerusalem District continues to carry out targeted enforcement against offenses involving undocumented residents and their employment, which may provide a platform for terrorist activity and harm the security of civilians.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The police further stated: “During an operation by officers from the Shalem Police Station in the Jerusalem District, an undocumented resident who had been employed for several days was located at a restaurant in East Jerusalem. The suspect was returned to the West Bank, while the employer was questioned and released under restrictive conditions.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Al-Shu’ala is one of the oldest and best-known popular restaurants in East Jerusalem. Founded in 1973 in the heart of Salah al-Din Street, it has operated for more than five decades and is considered one of the culinary institutions most closely associated with the eastern part of the city. The restaurant is a privately owned family business that has been managed by successive generations of the family that established it. Its staff consists of several dozen employees, most of whom live in East Jerusalem neighborhoods.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In May 2023, a raid by officers from the Shalem Police Station and Border Police troops uncovered Palestinian workers in the restaurant’s kitchen. They were residents of the Ramallah district and the Hebron area who had entered Israel without residency or employment permits. The owner and the business manager were detained for questioning at the Shalem Police Station, and a criminal case was opened against them for employing undocumented residents. The case was transferred to the Jerusalem District Prosecution Unit, but because it was the first documented offense of its kind in a considerable period, the proceedings ended with an administrative fine and a serious warning, without a prison sentence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In March 2025, during a large-scale Kedem Police Precinct enforcement operation against East Jerusalem businesses employing undocumented workers, the restaurant was searched again. Palestinian workers without permits, from towns and villages surrounding the Jerusalem envelope, were found on the premises. Because this was a repeat incident, the police imposed stricter release conditions on the owners. They were questioned under caution, required to deposit substantial financial guarantees with the court and signed a legal undertaking stating that if another undocumented worker were found at the business, the police would seek a long-term judicial closure order.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The lenient penalties appear not to have deterred the owners, and more significant action may now be required to curb a phenomenon described as posing a security risk to Jerusalem residents.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The popular Al-Shu’ala grill restaurant – whose name means “The Flame” – on Salah al-Din Street in East Jerusalem was closed on Wednesday for seven days under an administrative order issued by the deputy commander of the Israel Police’s Jerusalem District. The order followed the employment of an undocumented Palestinian resident of the West Bank. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":182611,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"9320","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[62,184,68],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-182613","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-breaking","category-184","category-68"],"acf":{"subtitle":"After another undocumented Palestinian worker was found on the premises, Al-Shu'ala restaurant on Salah al-Din Street in East Jerusalem was ordered closed for one week"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jerusalem-online.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/182613","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jerusalem-online.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jerusalem-online.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jerusalem-online.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jerusalem-online.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=182613"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/jerusalem-online.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/182613\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":182615,"href":"https:\/\/jerusalem-online.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/182613\/revisions\/182615"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jerusalem-online.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/182611"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jerusalem-online.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=182613"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jerusalem-online.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=182613"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jerusalem-online.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=182613"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}