Jerusalem, February 28: Fourteen people including two Israeli policemen were wounded in clashes at Jerusalem’s flashpoint Al-Aqsa mosque compound on Sunday, after police entered to arrest Palestinians who had hurled rocks at visitors they believed were Jewish extremists.
Dozens of Palestinians pelted stones at Israeli police, who responded with tear gas and rubber bullets, Palestinian sources said.
Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said that seven people had been arrested, and that two of his men were hurt while Palestinian sources said at least 12 people were injured in the confrontations.
Security forces entered the compound “as a preventive measure,” after Muslim worshippers threw rocks at the group of unidentified visitors, Rosenfeld said.
Police had stopped people over 50 from entering the compound as 20 people were holed up inside the mosque, Rosenfeld added.
“All of the Old City is calm, and thousands of tourists were allowed to visit the compound (mosque),” Rosenfeld said, as the violence subsided by early afternoon.
Sporadic clashes were reported in the predominantly Arab neighbourhood of Ras el-Amoud in east Jerusalem, which Israel annexed in 1967.
Earlier, dozens of police wearing riot gear were deployed throughout the narrow streets of the Old City as loudspeakers on minarets called on Muslims to “save Jerusalem.”
An official from Jerusalem’s Islamic Supreme Committee said the Palestinians had hurled stones at people they believed to be Jewish extremists intending to pray at the site and upset the delicate status quo.
“They threw rocks because (Israeli) settlers have been surrounding the compound for two or three days and had said they intended to enter on Sunday or Monday to pray at Al-Aqsa,” Adnan Husseini said.
Jews, who observe the Purim holiday on Sunday and Monday, are allowed into the compound, but authorities prevent them from praying there.
The Al-Aqsa mosque compound is Islam’s third-holiest site, after Mecca and Medina. Muslims refer to it as Al-Haram Al-Sharif and believe it to be the place where Prophet Mohammed made a night journey to heaven on horseback.
It is the holiest site in the world for Jews, who believe it was the location of the Second Temple, torched by the Romans in 70 AD, and refer to it as the Temple Mount.
The site has been bitterly contested for decades, and the second Palestinian uprising, or intifada, erupted there in September 2000 after a visit by Ariel Sharon, a right-wing politician who went on to become Israeli prime minister.
Violence erupted on several occasions starting last September after Muslim worshippers hurled stones at people they believed to be Jews seeking to pray at the site during major holidays.
Israeli authorities insisted then that the visitors were French tourists.
The latest disturbance came after days of clashes in the West Bank town of Hebron over an Israeli plan to renovate the Tomb of the Patriarchs there, another ancient site revered by Jews and Muslims.
Around 100 Palestinians clashed with Israeli troops in Hebron on Thursday over an Israeli plan to renovate two deeply contested holy sites in the occupied territory.
The plan has infuriated Palestinians and been criticised by the United States as a “provocative” act that could further complicate efforts to relaunch Middle East peace talks suspended during the Gaza war more than a year ago.
—Agencies