The Occupation Intensifies Its Violations in Jerusalem and Al-Aqsa, Turning the City into a Military Barracks

Jerusalem - Afaq News - The Jerusalem Governorate stated that the city of Jerusalem has witnessed, since the morning hours today, a serious escalation in the violations by the Israeli occupation authorities and settlers, coinciding with the third day of the so-called "Feast of Tabernacles" (Sukkot), warning of the danger of turning Jewish holidays into an occasion to impose new realities on the ground, violating the Al-Aqsa Mosque, and disrupting the lives and daily movement of Jerusalemites.

The governorate explained that the occupation forces closed the Wadi al-Rababah intersection in the town of Silwan since the morning hours, coinciding with students heading to their schools, which caused severe traffic congestion in the surrounding streets. They also closed the Bab al-Silsilah street towards the Bab al-Rahmah cemetery and Bab al-Maghariba, amid expectations that the closures would extend to other roads leading to the Buraq Wall, in order to secure the movement of settlers participating in the collective religious rituals.

The governorate confirmed that these measures do not represent mere temporary security arrangements, but rather constitute collective punishment for the Jerusalemites and a systematic restriction of their movement, utilizing the city and its facilities and streets to serve the rituals of the colonizers, at a time when the residents of Jerusalem are forced to bear the burdens of closures, congestion, and disruption of their interests and freedom of movement.

In the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque, the governorate stated that about 300 settlers stormed the mosque courtyards since the morning hours, coinciding with performing religious rituals related to the so-called "Feast of Tabernacles," in a scene that exceeds traditional incursions to an attempt to impose collective religious manifestations and rituals inside the mosque courtyards.

It pointed out that a number of settlers brought into the mosque what is known as the "four species" of plants associated with the rituals of the Feast of Tabernacles, while one of them left them inside the mosque to enable other settlers to use them later during their prayers and rituals, which the governorate considers a dangerous development in the nature of the incursions and a clear attempt to introduce Jewish holiday rituals into the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque.

Settlers performed the "Musaf" prayer in its specific form at what is called the "Temple Mount" within the courtyards of Al-Aqsa, including themes related to holiday sacrifices, simulating ancient Jewish worship rituals. The governor sees this as an attempt to impose a new religious perception on Al-Aqsa Mosque and to change its nature, function, and status, constituting an assault on the historical and legal status quo in the mosque.

The governor pointed out that the scene was not limited to performing prayers, as the courtyards of the mosque witnessed singing, dancing, and collective celebratory displays by the settlers during their incursions, in a provocative behavior that infringes upon the sanctity of the mosque and the feelings of Muslims, confirming that these incursions are increasingly turning into a space for holding public religious rituals inside the mosque.

The Jerusalem governor warned that the repeated allowance of these practices inside Al-Aqsa Mosque, along with the military protection provided to the intruders, represents a serious escalation in the policy of imposing facts on the ground, and an attempt to entrench a temporal and spatial division of the mosque, by exploiting Jewish holidays and religious occasions to impose new rituals within one of the holiest Islamic sites.

It emphasized that the protection of settlers during their incursions cannot be separated from the occupation measures that accompany them in the Old City, Silwan, and the vicinity of Al-Aqsa Mosque, including street closures, tightening military procedures, and disrupting the movement of citizens, which transforms Jerusalem into a city where the movement of its residents is managed according to the needs and rituals of the settlers.

The Jerusalem governor stressed that the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque is not an open space for the experiments of the occupation authorities and their settlers, nor a place for reproducing alleged historical rituals at the expense of the mosque's Islamic identity, warning that the continuation of these practices threatens to ignite the situation in Jerusalem and the entire region.

The governorate called on the international community, Arab and Islamic countries, and relevant international institutions to assume their legal, political, and moral responsibilities, and to take immediate action to stop the incursions and provocative rituals inside Al-Aqsa Mosque, and to pressure the occupying government to halt its measures targeting freedom of worship and the historical and legal status of the mosque.

It also called for documenting all violations witnessed in Jerusalem during the Hebrew holidays, including incursions, prayers, religious rituals, closures, and restrictions imposed on the movement of Jerusalemites, considering them part of an integrated policy aimed at changing the religious and cultural landscape of the city and imposing new realities by force.

The Jerusalem governorate affirmed that Jerusalem and its Al-Aqsa Mosque will remain a symbol of Palestinian national and religious identity, and that the measures of the occupation and the practices of settlers, no matter how escalated, do not grant legitimacy to the occupation over the mosque nor change the reality of its identity and religious and legal status.