The Israeli police announced this Wednesday that they had detained more than 350 people, after the violent confrontations that took place during the early hours of the morning in the Al-Aqsa mosque, in East Jerusalem.
“Israeli police arrested more than 350 people who violently barricaded themselves on the Temple Mount,” said the police, who used the Jewish term for the Mosque Esplanade in this statement.
Overnight, the Israeli police announced that they had entered Al-Aqsa to “dislodge the rioters”, who entered the mosque with “fireworks, sticks and stones”.
The Palestinian Islamic resistance movement Hamas, in power in the Gaza Strip, denounced an “unprecedented crime” and called on Palestinians in the West Bank to “go en masse and defend the mosque.” The same appeal was made by the Islamic Jihad movement, which, like Hamas, is considered a terrorist group by the European Union and the United States.
The Israeli police forces were forced to intervene to “evict the agitators” after having made arrests, the police said in a first statement, without advancing a number of detainees.
Following the announcement of clashes in Al-Aqsa, several rockets were fired from the Gaza Strip towards Israeli territory, according to journalists from the France-Presse news agency and witnesses.
The Israeli army said Gaza militants fired two volleys of rockets into southern Israel. Five rockets were intercepted in the Sderot area (south) and four fell in open areas, with no reports of casualties or damage.
The Palestinian leadership condemned the police operation, and Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas’s spokesman, Nabil Abu Rudeina, warned Israel that this situation “crosses all red lines and will lead to a huge explosion.”
Al-Aqsa stands on the Temple Mount, Islam’s third holy site in East Jerusalem, the Palestinian sector of the holy city occupied and annexed by Israel.
The Esplanade was built on what Jews call the Temple Mount, the holiest site in Judaism.
The clashes, which have been intensifying since the beginning of this year, occurred when Ramadan, the month of ritual fasting for Muslims, is still in progress, and when Jews are preparing to celebrate Easter, starting on Wednesday night. Passover, or Pesach, one of the most important holidays on the Jewish calendar.
Source: TSF
