Unrest breaks out after days of tension

Israeli riot police arrest a Palestinian stone-thrower during clashes outside Al Aqsa Mosque Yesterday’s clashes that broke out at al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem’s Old City following the Friday prayers when a large Israeli police force raided the premises to break up a protest march, dominated the news in Palestine today. “Several hundred worshippers threw stones at police who were stationed at the Mughrabi Gate, forcing them to go onto the plaza and push them toward the middle,” Israeli police spokeswoman Luba Samri was reported as saying.
Pictures have emerged, showing Israeli police in full riot gear roaming the yards of al-Aqsa Mosque compound with one picture showing smoke apparently from tear gas fired by the police covering the area. The unrest broke out after days of tension at the compound.
Two people suffered minor injuries, while one person was arrested for attempting to stab a policeman as he was being taken into custody, another Israeli spokesman added.
Nine people were arrested also on Thursday. Of them, five were Arab Israelis, who were accused of threatening Jewish and Christian visitors to the site, while four were Israeli Jews, three of them right-wing activists who tried to force their way onto the plaza.
In a week full of arrests, another three Arabs and two Jews were arrested on Tuesday for disturbing the peace and attacking police.
Deadly riots erupted at the same site after a visit by then Israeli opposition leader Ariel Sharon, at the outset of a Palestinian uprising in 2000.
Jordan criticized Israel Friday for entering the mosque, claiming that the Jewish state’s policies seek to “ignite religious violence” in the region.
“Jordan condemned the raid on the mosque compound as well as attacking unarmed worshippers,” Information Minister and government spokesman Samih Maayatah said in a statement carried by state-run Petra news agency.
“Israel’s policies against Islamic and Christian holy sites in Jerusalem seek to ignite religious violence in the region,” Maayatah added, calling for the international community “stop such violations.”
It has been reported that one of the incidents the official was referring to was the graffiti Jewish fanatics wrote on the door of a Christian monastery in Jerusalem last week defiling Jesus Christ and his mother, Mary.
The compound where Al-Aqsa stands houses the golden Dome of the Rock that marks the spot from which the Prophet Mohammad made his night journey to heaven.
The compound is also venerated by Jews as the site where King Herod’s temple stood before it was destroyed by the Romans in 70 AD.
It is one of the most sensitive sites in Jerusalem, and clashes frequently break out between Palestinians and Israeli security forces there.
Israel occupied East Jerusalem in a 1967 war – including the walled old city where the holy sites are located – and annexed it as part of its capital in a move never recognized internationally.
Palestinians want that part of the city as capital of a state they seek in Gaza and the occupied West Bank.
Meanwhile, reports have also suggested that Jewish settlers were involved in destroying dozens of olive trees and grape vines in the town of al-Khader, in the Bethlehem area. Palestinian farmers start harvesting their olives this week, considered one of the main sources of income for thousands of families throughout the West Bank.