Tag: jerusalem

Palestinian presidency rejects Israeli PM’s remarks on Jerusalem as clashes break out between Israelis and Palestinians over Israeli nationalists’ march

 The Palestinian presidency on Sunday rejected the remarks of Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, in which he said that “Jerusalem is a unified city.”

Palestinian Presidential Spokesman Nabil Abu Rudeineh said in a press statement that “East Jerusalem and all its holy sites will remain the eternal capital of the state of Palestine under the United Nations resolutions and international law.”

“Security and stability would never be achieved in the region as long as Israel continues its war on the Palestinian people and their land,” he said.

Abu Rudeineh added the only way to achieve stability and everlasting peace is “to gain the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people, mainly establishing an independent Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital.”

“The Israeli remarks will never give legitimacy to the occupation of the city of Jerusalem,” he noted, adding that the U.S. is requested to bear its responsibilities “to stop the Israeli violations and stop its double-standard policy.”

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On Sunday, the Israeli media reported that Bennett pledged at a ceremony in memory of the Ethiopian Jews who died attempting to reach Israel that “Jerusalem would remain a united city forever.”

“On Jerusalem Day, we mark not only the unity of our capital, but also the unity of our people,” said Bennett.

Dozens injured

Dozens of Palestinian protesters were injured on Sunday during clashes with Israeli soldiers in several West Bank towns and villages, according to the Palestine Red Crescent Society.

Among the injured were 20 shot by live ammunition, 45 by rubber bullets and dozens who inhaled tear gas, said the organization.

The clashes broke out during mass demonstrations all over the West Bank against the Israeli flag march.

The annual flag march, which was organized by far-right-wing Israeli groups to mark the “Jerusalem Day,” was joined by thousands of Israelis on Sunday afternoon in the old city of East Jerusalem.

The Israeli authorities have not given any comment on the incidents.

The Israeli flag march has not yet led to a new wave of tension between Israel and military groups led by the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) in the Gaza Strip.

What happened in Jerusalem “won’t be forgiven,” said Taher al-Nouno, an advisor to Ismail Haniyeh, Hamas politburo chief, in a press statement.

Al-Nouno said that Haniyeh, who is currently in Qatar, refused to give any guarantees to the mediating parties on what will be the Palestinian reactions to assaulting the Palestinians and the Al-Aqsa compound in East Jerusalem.

Tens of thousands of Jewish nationalists, some chanting racist slogans, marched through Jerusalem’s Old City on Sunday, sparking clashes between Israelis and Palestinians.

Israel’s state-owned Kan TV news estimated that some 50,000 people, mostly nationalist Israeli youths, attended the contentious annual “flag march” to mark the “Jerusalem Day,” when Israel annexed East Jerusalem in 1967.

The march started in the western part of the city and continued through the narrow Palestinian streets of the Old City’s Damascus Gate until reaching the Western Wall, just below the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, a holy flashpoint site for both Muslims and Jews.

Video footage on social media showed scores of young Israelis were waving Israel’s national flags, some of them chanting “Death to Arabs,” “We’ll burn down your village” and “Shuafat is on fire,” referring to the name of the Palestinian neighborhood from which 16-year-old Mohammed Abu Khdeir was kidnapped and burnt alive by far-right Israelis in 2014. Many also violently banged doors of Palestinian shops and homes.

Clashes broke out during the marches, with footage and photos showing Israelis spraying pepper gas and beating Palestinians, while the Palestinians throwing bottles of water and chairs at the other side.

The Palestinian Red Crescent said in a statement that at least 62 Palestinians were injured by rubber-coated bullets, beatings and pepper gas.

In Sheikh Jarrah, a Palestinian neighborhood north of the Old City, dozens of Israelis with “La Familia,” an ultra-nationalist group, threw stones at Palestinians and smashed car windows, the Israeli police said in a statement.

Israeli Prime Minister Bennett instructed in a statement the security forces to show zero tolerance for violence or provocations by extremist elements — among them La Familia — in Jerusalem.”

Meanwhile, tens of thousands of Palestinians have joined public protests organized in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip against the “flag march.”

In the West Bank, the cities of Ramallah, Al-Bireh, Nablus, Hebron, Bethlehem, Tubas, Qalqilya and Tulkarm have witnessed protesters shouting slogans against “Israeli violations” in East Jerusalem.

Mohammed al-Jaabari, a Hebron resident, told Xinhua that “I came here to express my anger against the ongoing Israeli violations against our holy place (Al-Aqsa Compound).”

The 39-year-old father of three said that “all Israeli attempts aimed at Judaizing Jerusalem will not succeed … Raising the Israeli flag in Jerusalem does not mean that it has become their capital.”

Amin Shoman, a senior Fatah leader, told Xinhua that “the demonstrations came to confirm that Jerusalem is the capital of the State of Palestine and the Palestinian people will not allow the city to be targeted by the Israelis.”

Clashes also broke out between the Palestinian protestors and the Israeli army in the West Bank.

A medical source at the Palestinian Red Crescent told Xinhua that 137 Palestinians were wounded, 11 of them by rubber bullets and others by tear gas.

Abu Yousef, a protester in Gaza, believes that Israel is “playing with fire irresponsibly and recklessly by allowing settlers to desecrate Islamic and Christian sanctities in Jerusalem and escalate the situation in the region.”

“For decades, Israelis have insisted on violating the international law, did not respect the decisions of international legitimacy, and considered itself above the law,” the man said, adding that “it is the time to prove to the Israelis that this land has strong people who can defend its holy places.”

Israel’s FM said the Jewish state is “committed” to status quo at Jerusalem’s holy site. “Muslims pray on the Temple Mount, non-Muslims visit. There is no change,” he said. “We have no plans to divide the Temple Mount between religions”

The Israeli foreign minister said on Sunday that Israel is “committed” to the status quo that bans Jews from praying at the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, the focal point of recent clashes in Jerusalem.

“Israel is committed to the status quo on the Temple Mount,” Yair Lapid said during a press briefing, using the Israeli name of the site which is holy to both Muslims and Jews.

“Muslims pray on the Temple Mount, non-Muslims visit. There is no change,” he said. “We have no plans to divide the Temple Mount between religions.”

Responding to criticism that Israeli security forces have been using excessive force against Palestinians during their clashes, Lapid accused Hamas, the Palestinian militant group that rules the Gaza Strip, of stoking the clashes by encouraging young Palestinians to hurl stones and firecrackers at the Israeli police.

“They’ve done this to create a provocation, to force the Israeli police to enter the Mosque and remove them,” he said.

At least 200 Palestinians have been injured in clashes with Israeli police since April 15, the day the Jewish week-long holiday of Passover began as Muslims have been observing their holy month of Ramadan.

The Palestinians accused Israel of triggering the clashes by allowing thousands of Jews to visit the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, which Jews revere as the site of their biblical-era temple that was destroyed in AD 70, to mark the holiday.

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The holy site is located in East Jerusalem, a territory that Israel captured in the 1967 Middle East war and annexed shortly later, claiming it part of its “indivisible” capital, in a move unrecognized by most of the international community.

The Al-Aqsa Mosque compound has been administered by Jordan but secured by the Israeli police.

Under a long-held status quo, Jews are allowed to visit the site but not to pray there. However, far-right extremists have begun to quietly pray at the site over the past years, while an ultra-nationalist Israeli movement, led by settler activists, calls for rebuilding the Jewish temple there. ■

Bennett talk to UN Chief

 Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett held a phone conversation with United Nations (UN) Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on the recent development of Israeli-Palestinian tensions, the prime minister’s office said.

Bennett told the UN chief that Israel is “the stabilizing force” in the conflicts. “If we did not uphold order, tens of thousands of Muslims would not be able to pray,” a premier office’s statement quoted him as saying.

His remarks came after weeks of tension in Jerusalem, where the Palestinians and the Israeli police clashed again at the holy site of the Al-Aqsa Mosque.

Bennett also expressed his disappointment “at the absence of condemnation by the UN for the firing of rockets at Israel,” said the statement.

Several rockets were fired into Israel from Gaza in the past week after months of quiet. In response, Israel announced the temporary closure of the sole pedestrian crossing from Gaza to Israel, though thousands of Gazans cross into Israel on a daily basis to make a living.