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JERUSALEM — The iron door at the entrance to the old Arab house in eastern Jerusalem opened only after a visitor knocked persistently for several minutes.

Inside was the mourning family of Farid al-Bashiti, an Arab realtor who was apparently murdered last week — allegedly because he helped sell Arab-owned land to Jews.

The murder comes as the struggle over land in Jerusalem has intensified in advance of final-status talks that will attempt to determine the city's future.

At the heart of that struggle are competing efforts by Israelis to acquire land in predominantly Arab eastern Jerusalem and Palestinian moves to stop them.

The allegation that Bashiti was murdered because of his deals with Jews was voiced loudly by Israeli officials — and whispered by Arabs fearful of Palestinian Authority retribution.

In Washington, U.S. State Department spokesman Nicholas Burns said the Clinton administration would find it "highly disturbing" if the allegation proved true.

Inside the mourners' home, one person identified himself as "Mohammad al-Bashiti, a cousin from England." Police said he was Bashiti's brother, but it was not surprising that the man wanted to keep some distance between himself and the deceased.

Farid al-Bashiti was found dead Friday of last week near a road in the West Bank town of Ramallah. His hands had been cuffed. A sharp blow to the head had caused his death, but there were signs he had been tortured.

Palestinian officials, informing the family of his death, said he had been killed in a traffic accident.

But both Israeli and Palestinian sources linked the murder to suspicions that Bashiti was involved in sales of Palestinian-owned land to Jews.

Land disputes heated up after Israel began construction in mid-March at Har Homa in southeastern Jerusalem. Reports that some land in the controversial Jewish neighborhood was sold by Arab owners triggered Palestinian anger.

Several weeks ago, Jerusalem's mufti, or Muslim religious leader, issued a ruling that all Muslims selling land to Jews would be sentenced to death. The mufti, Sheik Akrami Sabri, referred to Bashiti during his sermon Friday of last week at Jerusalem's al-Aksa mosque.

"They found the body of a Jew with a Muslim identity," he said mockingly, not even mentioning the deceased by name. "He ought not to be buried in a Muslim funeral."

Bashiti's family buried him secretly in Ramallah, but the body was disinterred for an autopsy. Another burial is planned at a Muslim cemetery in Jaffa.

Echoing the mufti's edict, Freih Abu Medein, the Palestinian Authority's justice minister, said last week that any Arab selling land to Jews would face the death penalty.

After Bashiti's body was found, Medein referred to the victim as a "traitor," and said traitors should be executed.

Bashiti was a close friend of Armenian Archbishop Ajamian, who recently sold a $5 million villa on the Mount of Olives to the Merkaz Harav Yeshiva.

The archbishop sold the house to a foreign company operating on behalf of Irving Moskowitz, a Jewish philanthropist from Miami who has been purchasing Arab land, according to Palestinian sources.

The villa will house students at the adjacent Beit Orot Yeshiva, which has operated for several years on the slopes of the mount.

"This is only the beginning," said Chaim Silberstein, director of the Beit Orot Yeshiva, referring to the acquisition of the Ajamian villa. "We already have three acres here under Jewish ownership, and we hope we can build here an entire city of Torah."

It is not clear whether Bashiti was involved with the villa sale, but from a political standpoint that does not matter. His death is serving as a warning to all Arabs to avoid deals with Jews, whether that means the Israeli government or private investors.

But official Palestinian moves to prevent land sales have not dissuaded Jews from seeking more deals.

"We are working in terms of eternity," said Matti Dan of Yeshivat Ateret Cohanim, the main force behind the Jewish purchase of property in the Old City's Muslim Quarter.

For their part, the Islamic religious authorities recently protested that the Israelis were planning to take over an area known as the Little Wall, which is in the yard of an Arab home and is an extension of the Western Wall.

Jews pray there on Shabbat and on holidays, and the Religious Affairs Ministry often cleans up the area.

A ministry spokesman says the government is considering setting up a prayer area beyond the Western Wall plaza — a move Palestinian religious officials say could spark violence.

Elsewhere in eastern Jerusalem, Jewish developers eye ambitious building plans.

Moskowitz has acquired almost four acres in the Ras el-Amud neighborhood east of the Temple Mount. Although Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu froze a plan to build 132 housing units for Jews in that neighborhood, legal committees heading the project approved it.

Another plan calls for linking Jerusalem to Ma'aleh Adumim, located further east on the road from Jerusalem to Jericho, by building a new neighborhood of 1,500 housing units and 3,000 hotel rooms on 2,500 acres.

Other proposals include a new neighborhood near Abu Dis, the Arab suburb of eastern Jerusalem that has often been mentioned as a possible capital of a future Palestinian state.

This week, the Israeli daily Ha'aretz reported that senior political officials are secretly considering plans to expand the Jerusalem's municipal boundaries by annexing Ma'aleh Adumim, Givat Ze'ev, Betar and the Etzion settlement bloc, making them part of a Greater Jerusalem.

Interior Minister Eli Suissa, who has been outspoken in his support of the idea, did not deny the Ha'aretz report.

But, reflecting the political sensitivity of the move, Suissa declined to comment further, saying, it was "better not to discuss it."