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White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel was photographed as he appeared to shed a tear at the Kotel (Western Wall) Thursday (see photos below). President Shimon Peres hosted Emanuel with his wife Amy and their children, Zach (13), Ilana (11) and Leah (10) in the Presidential Residence Thursday. Peres gave presents to Emanuel's wife and children and taught Zach, who is in Israel to celebrate his Bar Mitzvah, a lesson about the weekly Torah portion.

(IsraelNN.com) The Western Wall has been deemed too controversial a place for US President George W. Bush to visit. He is opting instead for Masada – where Jewish rebels committed mass suicide. Bush will be visiting Israel as part of Israel’s 60th Independence Day celebrations. His visit will be 60 hours long. In addition to addressing the Knesset, Bush is reportedly searching for a symbolic location to visit, with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert as his tour guide. Haaretz reported that Bush’s aids were leaning toward the Masada fortress. The site was where Jews held out against the Roman army, but...

Defense Minister Peretz, in the face of Muslim violence, appealed to Prime Minister Olmert to halt the construction of the footpath at the Rambam Gate to the Temple Mount. Olmert turned him down. Jews were blocked Thursday from reaching the Kotel (Western Wall) Prayer Plaza by the hundreds of Israeli-Arab protestors. Islamic clerics leading the demonstration as well as Arab politicians threatened an “Intifada worse than the previous one in 2000” if the Israel Antiquities Authority did not immediately halt the repair work and excavations at the site. Spokesman Aryeh King, representing the Jewish associations in the eastern part of...

Masses turn out for prayers at Western Wall for traditional priestly blessing on Sukkot. Psalms said for wounded and kidnapped soldiers alike Tens of thousands of worshippers showed up at the Western Wall in Jerusalem Monday to participate in the traditional priestly blessing. The morning prayers of Sukkot were held with the Chief Rabbis of Israel Rabbi Shlomo Amar and Rabbi Yonah Metzger in attendance. Following the prayers, the chief rabbis held a special prayer and recited psalms for the speedy recovery of those injured in the war and the return of the kidnapped soldiers. Afterwards, the custom of visiting...

Shades of the 1920's: A Jewish man was hauled off to the Old City police station in the middle of prayer for sounding the shofar during Rosh HaShanah services at the area known as the Kotel HaKatan. The incident occurred around 7:30 in the morning, at the northern-most section of the accessible Western Wall - a little-known area called the Kotel HaKatan, the Small Wall. It is considered to have extra sanctity, as it stands opposite the presumed spot of the Holy of Holies of the Beit HaMikdash. Yesterday morning (Sunday), a group of some 10 men and two women...

Jerusalem city engineers will take down the hill jutting out from the Western Wall, replacing it with a bridge. Archaeologists expect to find treasures, such as a tall gate from the Second Temple. The Jerusalem Municipality has decided to take down the hill that leads up from the Western Wall (Kotel) entrance to the Temple Mount, for fear that it might otherwise collapse. The walkway up the hill leads to the Mughrabim Gate, which is currently the only entrance for Jews to the Temple Mount. The city plans to replace the hill with a bridge that will lead into the...

Oct. 13, 2003 (Supreme Court of Israel:) Ultra-nationalists barred from Temple Mount By ETGAR LEFKOVITS Acting on police recommendations, the Supreme Court on Monday barred the leader of the fringe Temple Mount Faithful group, and the head of another small ultra-nationalist organization, from ascending the Temple Mount on Monday morning. The high court rejected an appeal by Gershon Solomon, and Yehuda Etzion to enter the ancient compound, after police warned that visits by either men could lead to bloodshed at the bitterly contested holy site. The Temple Mount was reopened to non-Muslims two months ago, after nearly three years when...

Mon Oct 13,12:31 PM ET Sukkot : Orthodox Jews attend the Jewish priest's blessing ceremony for Sukkot, the feast of the Tabernacles, at the Western Wall in the old city of Jerusalem. (AFP/Menahem Kahana) Mon Oct 13,12:18 PM ET Orthodox Jews of the Cohanim Priestly caste participate in a blessing as they hold the four items used during the Jewish holiday of Sukkot, next to the Western Wall in Jerusalem's Old City Monday Oct. 13, 2003. The holiday of Sukkot, also known as the Feast of Tabernacles is named for the huts the Israelites lived in as they wandered...

Building The Old City 14:17 Oct 12, '03 / 16 Tishrei 5764 Tens of thousands of people are expected to visit Jerusalem daily during this Sukkot holiday week, and dozens of events are planned throughout the country. After three years of difficult renovations on a burnt-out hovel, a new Jewish property will be dedicated in the Old Citys Moslem Quartertoday: Beit Reuven, named for a victim of the 1929 Arab pogroms in the Holy Land. Welfare Minister Zevulun Orlev of the National Religious Party will affix the mezuzah to the doorpost this afternoon, and a Jewish family will move...