NOVEMBER 2005
The most serious indication yet that
Israel Govt.is going to declare Gaza the only area for
Palestine as the Temple Mount People have long planned.
Palestinians will be turned from the mosque which will be
torn down to re-build the Jewish Temple:
Gazans barred from al-Aqsa mosque, a trial run?
By Khalid Amayreh in the West Bank
Friday 14 October 2005, 20:11 Makka Time, 17:11 GMT
Israel has barred Palestinians under the age of 45 and
those travelling from Gaza to pray at the Haram-al-Sharif
(Noble sanctuary) in al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem. No
Gazans have been allowed to reach the al-Aqsa mosque for
"security reasons", the Israeli authorities
said.
As many as a hundred thousand Palestinian Muslims
converged on Jerusalem's al-Aqsa mosque on Friday for the
traditional Juma'a (Friday) congregational prayers. Many
of the worshippers came by buses and cars from the
sizeable Islamic community in Israel's proper and East
Jerusalem. Muslims make up around one-fifth of Israel's
estimated 7-million population. However, for thousands of
West Bank Palestinians, the Israeli decision means
al-Aqsa will remain off limits to them.
Third holiest site
Al-Aqsa mosque, which Jews refer to as the Temple Mount,
is considered the third holiest Islamic place, directly
after the Sacred mosque in Makka and the Prophet's mosque
in Madina. According to tradition, the reward for a
single prayer at al-Aqsa is multiplied 500 times. I came
from Nablus to pray at the Haram-al-Sharif of Jerusalem,
but the Israeli police wouldn't allow me to pass,"
said Haitham Yusuf, a college student living in a small
village outside Nablus. "It is unfair. In this age
of religious freedom and tolerance, Muslims are denied
access to their religious sites. Just imagine how the
reactions of Jews would be if Jews were to be denied
access to their places of worship in New York or London
or Rome. "There is no such thing as true religious
freedom in Israel. We are after all under Israel's
military occupation. Occupation and freedom are
incompatible," he said.
Security considerations
An Israeli police spokesman told Aljazeera.net: "If
things go well, we might allow younger Palestinians to
pray at the mosques next Friday." He said the
restrictions were solely motivated by "security
considerations". ...
A new tunnel being dug by the
Israeli government under Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem,
while the world is occupied following the aggression of
Israelis in Gaza. Muslims fear that such channels may
threaten Al-Aqsa Mosque compound (Alquds, 9/28/05)
Earlier in October Muslims reported the
following:
Thousands Perform Friday Prayers in Al-Aqsa Mosque, as Occupied Jerusalem Turned into Israeli military Barracks
JERUSALEM, Palestine, October 8, 2005 (IPC + WAFA) - -
More than 10,000 residents of occupied Jerusalem and residents of 1948- occupied territories and few others of the West Bank performed the first Friday prayers of the holy month of Ramadan at Al-Aqsa Mosque, amid widespread Israeli occupation army presence, which turned the sacred city into military barracks.
Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) and the notorious 'border guards' unit have been deployed and beefed up since dawn inside Jerusalem's old city, especially between the markets, roads and gates leading to the holy mosque. They detained hundreds of youths and checked their ID cards till the end of the prayer's exact time.
WAFA news agency reported that the Israeli military procedures involved total closures of main roads in the city center that connect between the gates of St. Stephens and Jaffa, and the area of Ras Alamode.
IOF also forced a number of lorry drivers to empty occupants far from the Jerusalem wall. Moreover the Israeli helicopters hovered around Al- Aqsa Mosque and many parts of the old city to watch people who gathered in a mass prayer meeting.
WAFA added that Israeli police and border guards set up several military checkpoints and metal barriers; they also forced the residents to show their ID cards and attacked hawkers and spoiled their goods.
On the other hand, the Palestinian committees of order, scouts and gatekeepers of Al-Aqsa Mosque carried out arrangements and procedures to keep the public order and to show people who came to perform prayers the ways to prayer places, while the Red Crescent Association took upon itself medical care inside the Mosque.
Dr. Ekrema Sabry welcomed the gathered people in the courtyard of the Mosque and said, "your gathering to perform prayers in the mosque is a practical reaction against those who aspire to judaize Al-Aqsa Mosque."
He also spoke about the plots of the rightist Israeli Knesset member from Likud Party, Uzi Landau; who wants to attack Al-Aqsa Mosque. Dr. Sabry elaborated, "the so-called Landau is going to carry out his plan thinking that the Mosque is an object of bargaining or negotiation, ignoring to the wide attachment of Muslims to this holy place."
Dr. Sabry addressed the Israeli government by saying "Al-Aqsa Mosque is above to be subject to any bargain, if you want peace stop your evil deeds against the mosque and don't follow the acts of the extremists because they are digging a hole you can't get away from it."
He further noted that the Palestinian Directorate for Waqf and Religious Affairs took many procedures on the occasion of the holy month of Ramadan, which implied preventing beggars from begging inside the courtyard of the mosque and to be cautious of suspected persons or things and also to keep public order inside the mosque
A
PALESTINIAN VIEW
|
| by
Mahdi Abdul Hadi © Five years ago, this present intifada was sparked by a highly provocative intrusion by Ariel Sharon, then Israeli opposition leader, into the Aqsa Mosque. That Jerusalem should have been the source of five years of heavy fighting seems almost impossible to comprehend now that the city has fallen in a way I have never witnessed before. Physically, psychologically, socio-economically and demographically, Jerusalem has been divided and subjugated in a way that even its actual occupation in 1967 did not achieve. Settlements in and around Jerusalem are expanding at pace; the wall has separated the city from its West Bank hinterland and some of its own communities; and city planning within the Israeli-defined municipal borders is separating the remaining communities from each other. What is happening in Jerusalem today is, in fact, more similar to what happened in 1948. The city is being cleansed of its population, and the remaining population is being relieved of its rights. The Absentee Property Law is being invoked again, and those who find themselves outside the wall, but with property in Jerusalem, stand to lose that property to the Jewish state, just as those who fled or were forced to flee the fighting in 1948 saw their property confiscated according to this law, which barred them any recourse to law. On the ground, Jerusalem is being strangled in several ways. Quite literally, the eastern part of the city, denied any semblance of equality in the dispersal of municipal services, is crumbling. Meanwhile, the withy the city cut off from its main economic hinterland in the West Bank unemployment and poverty are rising along with taxation, leaving more and more people completely dependant on social security from Israel. Emasculated and isolated, Palestinian Jerusalemites, especially after the death of Faisal Husseini and the closure of Orient House, find themselves powerless and without leadership to confront the Israeli occupation and assert their identity. And, to make matters worse, the Palestinian Authority has provided neither an example nor leadership for Jerusalem. In such a position, it is little wonder that Jerusalem was long ago subdued and has remained quiet. There is only one thing that gathers people and which might draw them out into the street, and that is religion. Islam has become a new focal point, and this is true in general of this intifada. The role of Islam, both rhetorically and politically, has increased in power and allure even as the focal point of the last intifada, nationalism, has seen its star wane. In the case of Jerusalem, the role of Islam resonates far and wide. Even though the Muslim world is itself divided and conflict-torn, Jerusalem will always remain Islam’s third-holiest site. That will never be taken away, and as the national and secular leaders fail again and again to provide inspiring leadership, not only on Jerusalem, but in the West Bank and Gaza, it is only natural that the constants in life will be sought. People will turn to Islam. But it is a turn in desperation. There is little vision in this intifada outside anger. People are no longer sure what they are fighting for--a secular Palestine; an Islamic state; one or two states; Jerusalem, Gaza and the West Bank including the right of return--but they are sure what they are fighting against. They are fighting against oppression and occupation and a solution that is being imposed on them. They are fighting against a world unwilling or unable to uphold their rights. They are fighting against an Israel determined to not only to safeguard the Jewishness of Israel and establish it unalterably in Jerusalem, but to subjugate any possible future Palestinian state, either to itself or to Jordan, in a modification of the Jordan option that Sharon has never given up on. In Jerusalem, Palestinians are unable to fight but equally unable to accept any imposed solution. Five years down the line, I’m afraid the situation will be exactly the same.- Published 3/10/2005 © bitterlemons.org Mahdi
Abdul Hadi is head of the Palestinian Academic
Society for the Study of International Affairs,
PASSIA. |
