Israeli plan to build a new Jerusalem gate condemned by Palestinian government
The Palestinian Authority has denounced a potentially explosive Israeli plan to build a gate in the Ottoman walls of Jerusalem's storied Old City as a provocative move that could undermine peace talks.
But Haaretz, no friend of Israel in Jerusalem, writes:
The new gate will be an entry to a tunnel that would be hewn through the rock under all the layers of the city, beginning between Zion Gate and Dung Gate, leading to a four-story parking garage under the current parking lot not far from the Western Wall.
The Pals. go ballistic and also go wrong:-
Palestinian minister of religious affairs Taleb Abu Sha'ar warned that a devastating war is likely to happen between Muslims and Jews as a result of Israel's escalating Judaization plans in occupied Jerusalem, the latest of which in Al-Buraq wall square, west of the Aqsa Mosque. In a statement on Wednesday, Abu Sha'ar said that the Israeli occupation authority (IOA) in Jerusalem declared a plan to widen and change many Palestinian places in the old city of Jerusalem, especially the opening of a new door in the wall of the old city.
Now the entire Western Wall Plaza 'belongs' to Al-Aqsa?
And what do we hear from across the Jordan River?
This:-
The Royal Jordanian Committee for Jerusalem affairs has warned of a Zionist plan aimed at gaining full geographic and demographic control of the area surrounding the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Occupied Jerusalem by displacing the Palestinian population and Judaising the identity and landmarks of the holy city. In a press statement the secretary general of the committee, Abdullah Canaan, said that the Occupation is working toward the implementation of the Judaisation policy in Jerusalem through wide scale excavations and implementation of several commercial and tourist projects...[including] tunnels and electric elevators on the land belonging to the Al-Buraq site and below it
Inexact location reportage can cause a religious war, it seems although the Pals. penchant for propaganda over any semblance of truth is a contributory factor.
P.S.
The Telegraph reporter in Jerusalem, Adrian Blomfield, was the paper's Moscow correspondent since October 2005. Before that he was the East Africa correspondent.
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2 comments:
The Arabs now choose to call the Western Wall, the western retaining wall of the Temple Mount, al-Buraq wall. This refers to the Muslim legend, which appeared after Muhammad was cold in his grave, that his flying horse [al-Buraq = lightning] had flown him from Mecca to the Holy Place in Jerusalem [that is, the Temple Mount] where he had tethered this mount to the Western Wall. That is why they now call the western wall "al-Buraq wall." The notion that Muhammad came to Jerusalem and the Temple Mount only emerged around 690 CE, when the `Umayyad Dynasty, then ruling from Damascus was challenged by another dynasty which had taken over Mecca and Medina. Wanting to have a holy place, a locus of pilgrimage, of their very own, under their own control, the Umayyad caliph of the time, 690 CE, approx., built the Dome of the Rock and al-Aqsa mosque on the Temple Mount. The Rock under the Dome was what the Jews called the Foundation Rock [ אבן השתייה ]. So the famous rock under the dome gained fame and importance among Muslims because of its importance to Jews. Likewise the current Arab names for the city, al-Quda and Bayt al-Maqdis, are taken from Hebrew names, haQodesh and Beyt haMiqdash.
The earliest tradition concerning where he allegedly tied the winged thing was the Eastern Wall. It was actually Yassir Arafat, as I recall, who decided it was to the Western Wall... for obvious reasons.
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