Israel to Reopen Contested Holy Site in Jerusalem
JERUSALEM — Israel barred all access to a contested sacred site in the Old City for the first time in many years on Thursday, a step that a Palestinian spokesman denounced as “a declaration of war” and one that strained Israel’s crucial alliance with neighboring Jordan.
By nightfall, Israel moved to ease the simmering hostility by announcing the site, which Jews call the Temple Mount and Muslims the Noble Sanctuary, would reopen Friday morning. But the authorities said that Muslim men under 50 would be barred from prayers, as they have been frequently in recent weeks, and that Israeli police officers would be out in force. Palestinian leaders called for a mass protest.
The rare closing came after an Israeli counterterrorism unit killed a Palestinian man suspected of trying the night before to assassinate a leading agitator for increased Jewish access to the site, a cause that has fueled clashes at the site. It also followed months of rising tension and violence across the deeply divided city of Jerusalem, where Israel recently added 1,000 police officers in an effort to ward off what some experts warn could become a third Palestinian intifada, or uprising.
There is no more sensitive place in Jerusalem than the revered plateau where the ancient Jewish temples once stood — and where some extremists propose erecting a third one — and where thousands of Muslims now worship daily at Al Aksa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock.
Jordan’s king is the Aksa’s official custodian, so its fate has implications beyond the Israeli-Palestinian conflict — on Thursday, the Jordanian minister of Islamic affairs called the closing “state terrorism by the Israeli authorities.” In 2000, a visit to the site by the future Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon, accompanied by 1,000 Israeli police officers, helped ignite the violent second intifada.
“You are dealing with flammable material — it would be wise not to meddle in the business of holy places,” said Mustafa Abu Sway, dean of Islamic studies at Al Quds University and a member of the Islamic Waqf council, a trust that administers the site. “The average person is very upset. People are angry, and people are sad.”
East Jerusalem has been boiling since the start of summer, when a Palestinian teenager was kidnapped and killed in an apparent revenge attack for the earlier abduction-murder of three Israelis in the occupied West Bank. Some 800 youths have been arrested, accused of throwing stones or firebombs.
Events escalated further when a Palestinian driver plowed into a group of pedestrians in the northern part of Jerusalem last week, killing a 3-month-old Israeli baby and a young woman, and on Monday when Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel pushed forward plans to expand two Jewish neighborhoods considered illegal settlements by most of the world.
JERUSALEM — Israel barred all access to a contested sacred site in the Old City for the first time in many years on Thursday, a step that a Palestinian spokesman denounced as “a declaration of war” and one that strained Israel’s crucial alliance with neighboring Jordan.
By nightfall, Israel moved to ease the simmering hostility by announcing the site, which Jews call the Temple Mount and Muslims the Noble Sanctuary, would reopen Friday morning. But the authorities said that Muslim men under 50 would be barred from prayers, as they have been frequently in recent weeks, and that Israeli police officers would be out in force. Palestinian leaders called for a mass protest.
The rare closing came after an Israeli counterterrorism unit killed a Palestinian man suspected of trying the night before to assassinate a leading agitator for increased Jewish access to the site, a cause that has fueled clashes at the site. It also followed months of rising tension and violence across the deeply divided city of Jerusalem, where Israel recently added 1,000 police officers in an effort to ward off what some experts warn could become a third Palestinian intifada, or uprising.
There is no more sensitive place in Jerusalem than the revered plateau where the ancient Jewish temples once stood — and where some extremists propose erecting a third one — and where thousands of Muslims now worship daily at Al Aksa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock.
Jordan’s king is the Aksa’s official custodian, so its fate has implications beyond the Israeli-Palestinian conflict — on Thursday, the Jordanian minister of Islamic affairs called the closing “state terrorism by the Israeli authorities.” In 2000, a visit to the site by the future Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon, accompanied by 1,000 Israeli police officers, helped ignite the violent second intifada.
“You are dealing with flammable material — it would be wise not to meddle in the business of holy places,” said Mustafa Abu Sway, dean of Islamic studies at Al Quds University and a member of the Islamic Waqf council, a trust that administers the site. “The average person is very upset. People are angry, and people are sad.”
East Jerusalem has been boiling since the start of summer, when a Palestinian teenager was kidnapped and killed in an apparent revenge attack for the earlier abduction-murder of three Israelis in the occupied West Bank. Some 800 youths have been arrested, accused of throwing stones or firebombs.
Events escalated further when a Palestinian driver plowed into a group of pedestrians in the northern part of Jerusalem last week, killing a 3-month-old Israeli baby and a young woman, and on Monday when Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel pushed forward plans to expand two Jewish neighborhoods considered illegal settlements by most of the world.
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