Israeli police, on Sunday, violently suppressed a rally organized by Palestinian women who have been banned, by Israeli authorities, from entering annexed East Jerusalem’s al-Aqsa Mosque, for various periods of time, under ‘security pretexts’.WAFA correspondence reported that Israeli police quelled the rally using stun grenades against female protesters, however, no injuries were reported.
Dozens of Palestinian women have been protesting for months against being denied entry to al-Aqsa Mosque; A sit in was first organized in the neighborhood of Bab al-Majles al-Islami, located in the very heart of Jerusalem’s Old City, and was later moved to the nearby Bab al-Amoud area.
Forces further detained one of the protesters, identified as Hanadi al-Halawani, a Quran teacher who is also barred from entering the mosque, the third holiest site in Islam.
The Palestinian Territory, Gaza, and Israel, have been engulfed with a wave of violence since early October 2015, fueled by Israel’s unilateral enforcement of a temporal division on the mosque between Muslims and Jews.
Since then, over 180 Palestinian, including 43 children and nine women, have been killed by Israeli forces since the outbreak of violence across the Palestinian territories, in early October of 2015, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health.
Israeli police secure the entry of Israeli settlers into the mosque’s compound on an a daily basis, provoking tension with Muslim worshippers, who often respond by chanting religious slogans to protest their entry.
In related news, Al Ray reports that Israeli occupation authorities, with Jordan, have agreed on erecting surveillance cameras at the al-Aqsa compound before the Passover, next month, Israel Hayom website reported on Sunday.
Israeli radio quoted Israel Hayom as saying that the number of Jews who visited the holy site during the Passover has increased, noting that it is a common interest for Israeli and Palestinians.
In 2003, the Israeli government unilaterally decided — despite the objections of the Islamic Endowments Department — to allow non-Muslim visitors into the complex.
Since then, under increasingly right-wing Israeli governments, extremist Jewish settlers have been allowed into the site in ever greater numbers — usually protected by Israeli security forces — while Palestinian access to the site has become increasingly restricted.
Al Aqsa is venerated as Judaism’s most holy place, alleged to be the original site of Solomon’s Temple.
Christians outside of the Levant remain divided on the issue, as biblical end times prophecy states: ‘I did not see a temple in the city, because the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are its temple.’ ~Revelation 21:22
However, settler attacks on Christian holy sites have been progressive, in recent years, and are now on the increase, as well.
Jordanian and Israeli authorities were in dispute over erecting the surveillance cameras on the holy site. They were not agreed on the party who would control the system and on the technicality of by which way it will release the photos.
The main point of dispute was over controlling the camera system. Israel asked to be under its supervision, and to have the right to ban the photos it wished to hide.
Both Jordan and Palestine called for not giving Israeli authorities the right to manage the live broadcasting.
However, Israeli authorities asked to erect the cameras all over the holly compound under the pretext that their places help to discover where Palestinians hide weapons and stones. Jordan and Palestine strongly opposed it.
Also of interest: 2015: A Dangerous Escalation at Al-Aqsa Mosque
