Police stop Jews from praying on Temple Mount

[dayag]

The only group in Israel without freedom of worship are Jews.

Earlier Sunday, as part of Jerusalem Day events, National Union MKs Uri Ariel and Michael Ben-Ari arrived at the Temple Mount accompanied by a group of about 20 right-wing activists to conduct a tour of the site.

Originally, Ariel and Ben-Ari were supposed to be joined by fellow National Union MK Aryeh Eldad, along with Ze'ev Elkin (Likud) and Otniel Schneller (Kadima), who all cancelled at the last moment.

During the tour, four or five of the activists, including Ben-Ari himself, kneeled to pray on the Temple Mount, with a nearby police force preventing them from doing so.

However, as a result of the questioning of two the group's participants following the act, the tour's leader, Yehuda Eztion, a one-time member of the Gush Emunim Underground, sat on the ground and refused to move on.

He was then forcibly removed by police and arrested, with MK Ben-Ari confronting police officers to try and prevent the arrest.

source: http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomac...-bank-1.431485

[dayag]

The government needs to step in and protect the religious rights of non-Muslims on the Temple Mount. This is why sovereignty over the Mount must NEVER be given up.

A Wakf official told a Jewish student from the UK who was visiting the Temple Mount on Wednesday morning, to remove his kippa, saying that he was not allowed to wear it because he was “in a holy place.”

The 20-year-old from London, who studies at the University of Leeds in northern England and is in the country on a student mission, declined to remove the kippa and left the site instead.

Rabbi Chaim Richman of The Temple Institute said that the incident demonstrated “the opening of a new front of anti- Semitism at the hands of the Islamic Wakf committed to eradicating all Jewish connection to the site.”

The Jordanian Wakf that administers the site restricts non-Muslims from entering outside specific visiting hours, and no form of non-Muslim worship is permitted, including personal prayer. Religious clothing such as kippot and tzitzit, however, has always been permitted.

source: http://www.jpost.com/JewishWorld/Jew...aspx?id=274642

And yet another incident by the Waqf:

MK Aryeh Eldad (Ichud Leumi) called Thursday to end Muslim control over visits to the Temple Mount.

“The time has come to end the occupation,” he declared in a letter to Minister of the Interior Yitzchak Aharonovitch. “The Muslim occupation that occurred 1,300 years ago, and is still in effect on the Temple Mount, of course.”

Eldad was angered by the arrest of a Jewish visitor to the Temple Mount on Thursday morning, and the police’s decision to ban Rabbi Yisrael Ariel, who heads the Temple Mount institute, from visiting the holy site...

The Jewish man arrested Thursday morning was detained after quoting to his companions from the Mishnah, Rabbi Glick added. Jews are forbidden to pray on the Temple Mount, but are normally allowed to speak...

source: http://www.israelnationalnews.com/Ne...9#.T-OlGpB0gfw