Some 250 Jews said to visit Temple Mount with police on 2nd day of Rosh Hashanah
Jordanian foreign ministry says Muslim worshippers were prevented from reaching site while Jews were present, demands international condemnation of incident
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Some 250 Jews visited the Temple Mount in the Old City of Jerusalem on Sunday, the second day of Rosh Hashanah, or the Jewish New Year, according to Palestinian media.
The Palestinian Authority’s official WAFA news agency reported that some of the visitors “performed Talmudic rituals,” likely meaning they were performing religious practices or praying, under heavy police protection.
Some of the Jewish visitors to the site also “raised Israeli flags” on the mount, according to the English-language Saudi outlet Arab News.
Non-Muslim prayer had until recently been forbidden atop the Temple Mount — known in Islam as Haram al-Sharif — due to a string of agreements generally known as the “status quo” between Israel and Jordan, which administers the site through the Jerusalem Islamic Waqf.
Under the status quo, only Muslims are permitted to worship on the Temple Mount itself, while Jews pray at the Western Wall, revered as a remnant of the Second Temple. Israel maintains overall security at the site, but the Islamic Waqf administers religious activities there.
In the past, police would eject or detain Jewish visitors caught praying at the site, but the policy has largely fallen by the wayside over the past several years under far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, who has repeatedly demanded that police allow Jews to pray there.
The hotly disputed site is the holiest site in Judaism and the third-holiest in Islam, and is believed to be the location of both ancient Jewish temples. Since the 7th century, it has housed the Al-Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock shrine. Conflicts around the site have sparked several rounds of violence in the region.
Jordan, in a statement released by its foreign ministry, alleged that for the duration of the Jewish visit to the Temple Mount on Sunday, Muslim worshipers were prevented from entering the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, in what it said was a “flagrant violation of the historical and legal status quo” at the site.
The ministry’s spokesman, Fouad Al-Majali, “affirmed the Kingdom’s absolute rejection and strong condemnation of the continued incursions by extremist settlers into the Al-Aqsa Mosque/Haram al-Sharif, the facilitation of these incursions by the Israeli occupation police, and the imposition of restrictions on the entry of worshippers,” the statement added.
The statement went on to urge the international community to demand that Israel “cease its violations and illegal practices against Islamic and Christian holy sites in Jerusalem,” and reiterated that the Temple Mount “is a place of worship exclusively for Muslims.”
Despite the informal changes to Israel’s policy on Jewish prayer at the Temple Mount in recent years, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has frequently insisted that “Israel’s policy of maintaining the status quo on the Temple Mount has not changed and will not change.”
The Times of Israel Community.