Israel’s hardline nationwide safety minister has sparked outrage throughout the Muslim world – by flouting a decades-old association geared toward preserving in verify non secular tensions over Jerusalem’s Temple Mount.
On Sunday, Itamar Ben-Gvir prayed on the Al Aqsa Mosque compound that sits atop the Temple Mount, or Haram al-Sharif, as it’s identified to Muslims. A spokesperson for Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas mentioned his go to “crossed all purple strains”.
What is the historical past?
“The historical past of the Temple Mount is considered one of perpetual friction,” mentioned Simon Kupfer in The Times of Israel.
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It was the positioning of King Solomon’s temple, destroyed by the Babylonians in 587BC, then rebuilt in 516BC solely to be razed once more, this time by the Romans, throughout the Nice Jewish Revolt of AD70. It stays the holiest web site in Judaism. Within the seventh century, the Islamic Caliph Abd al Malik conquered Jerusalem and constructed the Dome of the Rock and the Al Aqsa Mosque there. The positioning then turned the third holiest web site in Islam, after Mecca and Medina.
Jerusalem modified palms repeatedly instances over the following 1000 years, with management of the positioning usually falling to every faith in flip. “After the 1948 Israeli-Arab conflict, Jordan managed the Temple Mount and barred Jews from praying there,” mentioned Kupfer. Then, in 1967, Israel “stormed East Jerusalem” throughout the Six Day Conflict and “raised the Israel flag over the Dome of the Rock”. The then Israeli authorities, nonetheless, handed “day-to-day management of the temple” to a Jordanian-controlled Islamic belief known as the Waqf, and “thus started the established order that continues to be in place right now”.
Below a “delicate, decades-old association” with Muslim authorities, “Jews can go to however might not pray there”, mentioned Sky News. “Ideas that Israel might alter the foundations on the compound have sparked outrage within the Muslim world earlier than, and ignited violence up to now.”
What is the newest flashpoint?
Final Sunday was Tisha B’Av, a day of mourning and repentance, when Jews mirror on the destruction of Solomon’s temples. Ben-Gvir selected that day to guide a gaggle of over 1000 worshippers in prayer, singing and dancing on the foot of the steps of the Al Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock.
The hardline nationwide safety minister has been sanctioned by the UK for “repeated incitements of violence in opposition to Palestinian communities” within the occupied West Financial institution. And on Sunday he known as for Israel to “conquer and declare sovereignty” over Gaza and “encourage” Palestinians to go away the enclave.
Since getting into authorities in 2022, Ben-Gvir has “persistently undermined the police’s laws for the Temple Mount and stoked outrage within the Arab and Muslim world”, mentioned Amos Harel in Haaretz. He has visited the positioning on quite a few earlier events however that is the primary time he has led a congregation in prayer.
What’s going to all of it imply?
Arab nations, together with Saudi Arabia and Jordan, have condemned Ben-Gvir’s motion, with Jordan describing it as a “blatant violation of worldwide regulation and worldwide humanitarian regulation, an unacceptable provocation, and a condemned escalation”. Hamas mentioned it represented a “grave and escalating crime in opposition to the mosque”.
The timing of the go to “should be understood in a broader political context”, mentioned Haaretz’s Harel. With Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu dealing with rising public stress to agree a cope with Hamas to safe the discharge of the remaining hostages and finish the conflict in Gaza, Ben-Gvir has clearly sought to pour “fuel on the hearth”.
Netanyahu’s workplace has been fast to emphasize that Israel’s coverage of sustaining the established order at Al Aqsa “has not modified and won’t change”. So “both Netanyahu was unconnected to the occasions on the Temple Mount, or the go to was co-ordinated with Ben-Gvir, with the negotiations on a hostage deal within the background”.
“There’s, sadly, no clear answer” to the non secular tensions across the web site, mentioned Kupfer in The Occasions of Israel. “Any makes an attempt to impose rights for Jews to wish there’ll most definitely, if not actually, be met with yet one more violent resistance. Any Israeli withdrawal will embolden Hamas and Hezbollah.”
The historical past of the Mount is “soaked in blood”. It isn’t a query of whether or not it “will spark one other flame that ignites one other battle however, somewhat, when”.
