Israeli forces demolished two houses 0n Wednesday belonging to Palestinian families in the Silwan neighbourhood of occupied East Jerusalem, south of the Al-Aqsa Mosque.

After two years of construction, the al-Khalialeh families had made ready their houses to move into in the near future, their relative Jamal al-Khalialeh told Middle East Eye.

The two families were shocked to wake up on the first day of the new year to hear that Israeli bulldozers accompanied by military forces were demolishing the two houses.

They were not at the scene when Israeli security forces had earlier broken into the two properties, local media reported.

"They had an Israeli court hearing at 10am to look into the issue of demolishing the houses, but at 8:30 am they were surprised to hear the demolishing vehicles had come to knock down their houses," said Jamal.

The two houses are 100 metres square and located next to each other.

The first house is owned by Wafa al-Khalialeh with her husband and their seven children. The second house belonged to Mohanad al-Khalialeh and his wife and their two children.