Israel reopened the Al-Aqsa mosque compound and lifted a days-old lockdown of the occupied West Bank on Wednesday, a day after occupied Jerusalem saw the heaviest clashes in years between Palestinians and Israeli occupation soldiers.
Al Manar TV, 17 March 2010
Israeli occupation police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said his forces remained on high alert for any unrest but that the mosque compound had been reopened.
Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak meanwhile ordered the lockdown of the West Bank to be lifted overnight, an occupation army spokesman told AFP.
Israel had on Saturday extended the lockdown and restricted access to the holy site as tensions soared in occupied Jerusalem over the opening of “Hurva” (Ruin) synagogue in the Old City, a few hundred meters from the holy compound.
Israel sealed off the West Bank on Friday after the announcement that it planned to build new homes for Israeli settlers in annexed Arab east Jerusalem sparked a row with Washington and fuelled anger in the Palestinian territories.
Israeli occupation forces used rubber bullets and teargas on Tuesday to disperse Palestinian demonstrations wounding 150 citizens. Medical sources said that 50 of the injured were hospitalized for treatment of bullet wounds while 100 received field treatment for breathing difficulties. They added that occupation troops blocked entry of medical teams to the Old City of occupied Jerusalem.
Meanwhile, the armed wing of Fatah, the Aqsa Martyrs Brigades called on the Palestinian Authority to give back the weapons it had confiscated from the group’s gunmen so that they could participate in the occupied “Jerusalem Intifada.” The call came as both the PA and Hamas continued to accuse Israel of planning to destroy the mosques on the Al-Aqsa compound in occupied Jerusalem.
“We call on all the Palestinian security services in the West Bank to release all Palestinian fighters from prison and to give them back their weapons so that they can join their people in defending Jerusalem against Israeli aggression,” the armed group, which was supposed to have been dismantled years ago in line with understandings between the PA and the US, said in a leaflet distributed in Ramallah.
The group also called on its members to “resist Israeli attempts to turn Jerusalem into a Jewish city and to respond to the series of Israeli assaults on Islamic and Christian holy sites.”
Although the PA leadership has been calling on Palestinians to demonstrate against Israel’s scheme to destroy the Al-Aqsa mosque, Palestinian security forces have banned street protests in many Palestinian cities, eyewitnesses told The Jerusalem Post.
They quoted PA security officials as saying that demonstrations were only allowed in areas under Israeli control, including occupied Jerusalem, and that there was no need to protest inside Palestinian cities in the occupied West Bank.
Hatem Abdel Kader, a top Fatah official in occupied Jerusalem and the former PA minister for Jerusalem Affairs, confirmed that the PA security forces were stopping Palestinians from demonstrating in many parts of the occupied West Bank.
Abdel Kader said that the PA and several Palestinian factions were preventing the Palestinians from venting their anger and frustration over Israel’s measures in occupied Jerusalem.
The Fatah official said that divisions between Fatah and Hamas were also torpedoing Palestinian efforts to launch a new intifada and stand united against Israel.
Abdel Kader told Post that he later received a phone call from Tayeb Abdel Rahim, an aide to PA President Mahmoud Abbas, threatening to punish him for stating that the PA was preventing anti-Israel demonstrations in its areas.
“This man thinks he’s the military governor of the West Bank,” Abdel Kader said. “Instead of dealing with the important issue of Jerusalem, Abbas’s office is threatening to punish me for telling the truth. They forgot that I’m an elected member of parliament and that I’m in charge of the Jerusalem portfolio in Fatah.”
The PA leadership in the occupied West Bank on Tuesday sent copies of a letter to members of the so-called “Quartet” – the US, EU, UN and Russia – urging them to intervene to stop Israel from “creating new facts on the ground, particularly in Jerusalem.”
Chief Negotiator Saeb Erekat headed with the letters to Moscow, where representatives of the Quartet are scheduled to meet next week. The letter accuses Israel of continuing to expand existing settlements and claims that Israeli authorities are working to “Judaize” Jerusalem.
Abbas Zaki, a member of the Fatah Central Committee, predicted that the clashes, which broke out in occupied Jerusalem in the past few days, would escalate “if Israel insisted on pursuing its scheme to rebuild the so-called Temple Mount.”
Palestinians have in recent days said that the inauguration of the synagogue was part of a conspiracy aimed at destroying the Al-Aqsa Mosque. “The battle for Jerusalem is the battle of all Palestinians and Arabs, regardless of their religion,” Zaki said. “We are facing huge challenges that need to be confronted.”
Hamas also urged Palestinians on Tuesday to step up the protests against Israel’s measures in occupied Jerusalem. The appeal came after the Islamic resistance movement called for a day of “rage”.
The armed wing of Hamas, Ezzeddine al-Qassam, said recent events in occupied Jerusalem will lead to “a new explosion in the face of the Zionist entity.” The group called on the PA to stop security coordination with Israel and to allow armed resistance to resume its operations against Israelis.
Ahmed Bahr, a senior Hamas official in the Gaza Strip, called for a “military strike” against Israel. He also called on the Arab countries to withdraw their support for holding indirect talks between Israel and the PA.
FATAH LEADER: “INTIFADA ONLY BRINGS DISASTERS”
Tayseer Nasrallah, a Fatah leader, has criticized calls for igniting a third intifada against the ongoing Israeli violations in occupied Jerusalem.
He said in a press statement on Tuesday that he was against an armed intifada against occupation, adding that in the past Al-Aqsa intifada arms were used against "the biggest military arsenal in the region and the results were catastrophic for the Palestinian people".
However, Palestinians in the Gaza Strip and in Bethlehem hit the streets on Tuesday in solidarity with their brethren in occupied Jerusalem who went on angry demonstrations to protest the Israeli violations of the Islamic holy sites in the holy city.
