Controversial new tunnel opened in Jerusalem

Israeli authorities officially opened a controversial tunnel network in Jerusalem on Monday, which stretches from Wadi Hilweh in Silwan to the Al-Aqsa Mosque, according to Al Aqsa Institute. The Institute said that the tunnel breaks through the ancient city wall in Jerusalem to reach the southern borders of the western wall of the Al-Aqsa Mosque in the Al Buraq wall. It ends near the Mughrabi Gate, not far from Al-Buraq Mosque. There has been concern that the tunnel has damaged the foundations of the sacred Al-Aqsa mosque. The Israeli newspaper, Haaretz, reports that the Israeli government intends for the tunnel network to be a tourist site, attracting up to half-a-million international visitors each year. "After works which lasted seven years, the last part of the tunnel, which is 600 metres (yards) long and was used for draining rainwater during the Second Temple period, has been cleared," an Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) spokesman said. He told AFP the project was "purely archaeological" and that the tunnel "does not go under the Temple Mount" -- the Jewish term for the site which formerly housed the Second Temple but is now the site of the mosque plaza. However, Haaretz suggested more cynical motives, quoting a source that suggested that the project is aimed at settling new Israeli settlements in Jerusalem’s Muslim quarter, by linking them to settlements in Silwan. "These tunnels constitute a third dimension for settlement activity in Jerusalem, in addition to the settlement areas spread in the city and the religious dimension constituted in the Wailing Wall and other synagogues," said the unnamed source.