Al-Aqsa Imam Warns of 'Explosion' Hours after Being Shot with Rubber Bullet

Rasa - The Imam of Al-Aqsa Mosque warned of an "explosion" over the control of access to the city's holiest site, the Noble Sanctuary, hours after being shot by an Israeli rubber bullet in the latest clashes between Israeli police and Palestinian protesters.

News ID: 431119

Date: 20 July 2017 - 23:30

RNA - Speaking after being released from hospital, Sheikh Ikrima Sabri said the continued lockdown of the site by Israeli police would lead to more violence, and only the removal of security checkpoints and the reopening of gates could end the dispute, Middle East Eye reported.

If Israel wants peace they have to immediately remove the metal doors and other security obstacles.

"I want to tell Israel and the world that if Israel wants peace they have to immediately remove the metal doors and other security obstacles they put in the last week," he said.

"And that's to happen today and before the Friday prayer. Otherwise the situation will explode and all the possibilities are open. And don't say we didn't tell you."

His comments come a day before a planned Palestinian "day of rage" in Jerusalem and the occupied West Bank, called for by the Fatah movement, which is incensed at the Israeli response to an attack near the site last Friday that left three Palestinian gunmen and two Israeli police dead.

Israeli police now man two of seven gates to the Noble Sanctuary, which houses al-Aqsa mosque - the third holiest site in Islam - and have closed the other five. Sabri was arrested hours after the gun attack and questioned by Israeli police.

The area is known as "Temple Mount" to Jews but is administrated by Jordanian religious leaders known as the Waqf.

Sabri suffered minor injuries in clashes on Thursday night, after leading thousands of Palestinians in a protest prayer at the site's Lion's Gate - the focus of almost a week of violence.

There were also protests in Qalandia, Shufat and Bethlehem in the occupied West Bank as Palestinians refused to accept the increased Israeli security in Jerusalem's Old City.

Shortly after the Friday attack Israel's public security minister, Gilad Erdan, justified the extra security measures, saying that al-Aqsa was being used to "incite terrorism" and that Israel would have to take control.

"We aren’t happy to have to take action on the Temple Mount, but when we have to, we will. The fact that terrorists are using the Temple Mount starts from incitement."

Today, Sabri said: "There is no occupation power that has the right to control the Aqsa mosque and what Israel is doing is [an] ugly violation against international laws.

"We are asking Erdan to step back from his statement that they own the Temple Mount and that it's under their authority. It's very dangerous statement.

"Israel is using the last Friday's attack to impose more control in al-Aqsa mosque as part of its ongoing plan to change the status quo. We refuse it and the thousands of people who came to protest the last few days confused the Israeli authorities."

He said that Israeli authorities had inflamed the situation even before the Friday attack.

"Israel all the time was violating the situation in the Aqsa and letting many settlers to enter. They are trying to take away the authority from the Islamic Waqf."

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