Israeli visitors and police on the Temple Mount. (Sliman Khader/Flash90)
Israelis visited the Temple Mount, the Palestinians rioted, and Jordan threatened Israel.
The Israeli Police on Wednesday arrested two Palestinian guards from the Temple Mount’s Islamic Waqf after they attacked a group of Israeli visitors and police officers at the holy site, amid the 50th anniversary celebrations of Jerusalem’s reunification.
A group of Jewish visitors, among the hundreds of Israeli visitors who visited the site on Wednesday, began singing Hatikvah, Israel’s national anthem, on the Temple Mount. The police, who deemed the action a breach of protocol, attempted to quickly remove the Jewish group from the holy site, while Waqf officials began taunting and attacking the visitors, as well as police officers.
“The police officers got the group away from the [Temple] Mount and arrested two of the Waqf officials,” a police spokesman stated, adding that it launched an investigation into the incident.
Al-Aqsa compound director Sheikh Omar al-Kiswani told the Palestinian Ma’an news agency that Israeli police forces assaulted a group of four of the mosque’s guards at Lion’s Gate after the guards “objected to the provocative behaviors of Israeli settlers during their raid of Al-Aqsa.”
Jordan condemned the “Israeli occupation authorities” for “allowing Jewish extremists to storm Al Aqsa Mosque,” an incident which “provokes Muslims around the world.”
Minister of State for Media Affairs Mohammad Momani said the government held Israel responsible for the incident.
“Israeli hostility will have severe consequences on Muslims holy sites, international laws, and the peace agreement signed with Jordan,” Momani threatened.
Momani claimed that Israel was taking measures to change the status quo on the Temple Mount, “where only Muslims can worship.”
The Muslim Waqf, under Jordanian guidance, is entrusted with securing the Temple Mount.
The Temple Mount has been the site of multiple incidents of Palestinian violence against Jewish visitors.
Though Palestinians deny any Jewish link to the site, the Temple Mount is the location of the first two Jewish Temples and the holiest site in Judaism. The Palestinians deny the Temples ever existed.
By: Aryeh Savir, World Israel News
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