Posted on 02/07/2007 10:21:34 AM PST by Alouette
The Fatah-affiliated Aksa Martyrs Brigades threatened on Wednesday to attack synagogues if Israel continued its excavation near the Temple Mount ahead of the planned construction of a new bridge to the Mughrabi Gate.
In a press release sent to newspapers, the group announced that all synagogues would become legitimate targets and that "the sanctity of the Al Aksa Mosque should not be less than that of the synagogues."
The terror organization joined scores of other Islamic organizations in calling on the Palestinian people to hold processions and angry protests until the construction is stopped.
Islamic heads urge new intifada over Mount work A Jerusalem court on Wednesday ordered the fiery leader of the Islamic Movement in Israel to stay out of the Old City of Jerusalem for the next ten days, after he tried to force his way to the site of a contested archeological excavation near the Temple Mount, police said.
Sheikh Raed Salah was one of seven Israeli Arabs detained by police near the Dung Gate on Wednesday morning.
Salah and his supporters had scuffled with police guarding the workers carrying out the salvage excavation near the Temple Mount.
The Jerusalem Magistrate's Court ordered Salah to stay 150 meters outside the walled Old City for the next ten days, Jerusalem police spokeswoman Sigal Toledo said.
In court, Salah accused Israel of "the crime of demolishing a part of the blessed Al Aksa compound" and of "pushing the whole region to religious war."
The archeological excavation underway ahead of the planned construction of a new bridge to the Mughrabi Gate is taking place dozens of meters outside the Temple Mount compound.
Salah, who heads the extremist northern branch of the Islamic Movement of Israeli Arabs which denies Israel's legitimacy, had previously called for an intifada over the archeological dig by the Jerusalem holy site on Tuesday.
In the past, Salah has served a two year sentence for a series of security offenses, including financing Hamas activities.
For the second straight day, police had barred non-Muslims from entering the Temple Mount on Wednesday and limited Muslim entry to the holy site to men over the age of 45 with Israeli id's, in a largely successful effort to ward off violence at the compound.
In sporadic stone-throwing clashes in east Jerusalem, seven Arab teens were arrested by police.
Police, who are bracing for renewed violence following Friday Muslim prayers, are expected to extend restrictions at the holy site in the coming days.
Meanwhile, Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Wednesday urged Islamic nations to retaliate against Israel.
Khamenei did not say what sort of response he intended, but he said the Islamic world should make Israel "regret" what it is doing, The Associated Press reported.
The eight-month construction project is meant to replace a decades-old stone ramp that partially collapsed in a snowstorm three years ago.
The Temple Mount, which is Judaism's holiest and Islam's third holiest site, has been the scene of violence in the past, which later spilled out across the country.
Israel's opening of the Western Wall tunnels in 1996 sparked a wave of Palestinian violence that killed 80 people, while Ariel Sharon's 2000 visit to the Temple Mount as opposition leader was followed by the latest round of Palestinian violence that has continued for over six years.
Israeli efforts to downplay the dig near the bitterly contested holy site -- known as the tinderbox of the Middle East -- fell on deaf ears in the Arab public, with Arab media playing up the heated rhetoric of Islamic officials blasting the work.
In a sign of continued tension, the Islamic Movement announced that it planned to hold a demonstration Friday against the dig.
There has never been any archeological excavations on the Temple Mount due to religious sensitivities.
According to decades-old regulation in place at the Temple Mount, Israel maintains overall security control at the site, while the Wakf, or Islamic Trust, is charged with day- to-day administration of the ancient compound.
The latest controversy comes as an ancient wooden pulpit destroyed four decades ago by a deranged Australian tourist hoping to hasten the coming of the Messiah was restored in the El Aksa Mosque, and as Jordan presses ahead with plans to build a fifth minaret at the site.
Last decade, Wakf officials built the largest mosque in Israel in an underground architectural support of the Temple Mount known as the Solomon's Stables, throwing dozens of truckloads of antiquities mixed with rubble in a garbage dump outside the Old City.
The construction of the mosque, which was carried out without any archeological supervision, was later called an "unprecedented archeological crime" by Israel's top archeological body for its massive destruction of antiquities at the site.
Warning! This is a high-volume ping list.
(sigh) Could you guys go be crazy somewhere else, please?
No comment.
-Eric
What do facts have to do with anything?!?!
They are simply put: CRAZY. They don't want repairs or excavations because they know that archeological findings will prove (again) that the site is the Temple Mount written about in the Holy Bible and will prove (again) that their "religion" is nothing but a fantasy created by a lunatic criminal to gain control of the Ka'abba in Mecca and they are the idiots who have fallen for it.
They are just doing what they do best -- threats and acts of violence.
These bastards are trying to provoke Israel and to start a war so that the media will blame it all on Israel.
Excavation "near" the Temple Mount. How "near"?
Just smite the vermin.
That's what's potentially hilarious about this (in a "big picture" sort of way). Everybody's wringing their hands over whether or not Israel will attack Iran for its nuclear program, and these goofballs may roll out the red carpet for a strike by attacking Israel over nothing.
It only shows the primitive mentality that reasonble men must deal with . It prooves how wrong the Palestinians are, how fanatical they are, how incredibly ignorant their religous leaders are. They are filled with hatred. Islam is not a religion it is a form of insanity.
"Islam is not a religion it is a form of insanity."
We have finally stubbled upon the connection between liberals & islam.
This is just another cheap ploy to try to stop the paleolithic palestinians from killing each other and to refocus on killing the Jews.
Its time this guy went to the top of the Mossad hit list.
The archeological excavation underway ahead of the planned construction of a new bridge to the Mughrabi Gate is taking place dozens of meters outside the Temple Mount compound.
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There has never been any archeological excavations on the Temple Mount due to religious sensitivities.
Any excuse to raise hell, no matter how flimsy the foundation. These fanatics won't stop until they're dead.
High volume. Articles on Israel can also be found by clicking on the Topic or Keyword Israel, WOT
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We're training them in convoy security and airport security, wonder if we're training them in Synagogue security.
The path to the Temple mount goes through the vegetation at the top. The whole structure in the mid-left is apparently deteriorating due to weather, foot traffic, etc. If you go to the top and look down the other side, you see this:
So the excavations are right on the Western wall, the remains of Herod's Temple. The Israelis have done a marvellous job of excavation around the southwest corner of the Temple mount. There's a tremendous museum just west of the excavations. Strangely enough, when we were travelling there last spring some lunatic Palestinian was running around the city wall near the excavation site and the poor Israeli police and the IDF had to restrict access to certain parts of the site. Those people are indeed exasperating.
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