Foreign Minister and Prime Minister-designate Yair Lapid sparked criticism for claiming the Western Wall, not the Temple Mount, is the holiest site in Judaism at a Yesh Atid faction meeting in the Knesset, Monday. Lapid said Jews have visitation rights at the Temple Mount and Muslims have freedom of worship at the site. A Jew who wants to pray can do so at the Western Wall, the holiest place for Jews, he said.
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Lapid's remarks drew criticism as the Temple Mount, the site of the First and Second Temples, is in fact the holiest place in Judaism, while the Western Wall is one of the four walls that encompassed the biblical temples for thousands of years. Furthermore, according to Jewish tradition, the Temple Mount is the site where the world was created and where the binding of Isaac took place. Jews from all over the world pray in the direction of the Temple Mount.
Lapid's remarks followed Prime Minister Naftali Bennett's assertion Jews could enjoy "freedom of worship" at the site. Bennett later tempered his claim to say Jews would have freedom to visit the Temple Mount.
In another unusual move Monday, Yamina MK Amichai Chikli visited the Temple Mount and sang Israel's national anthem. The move was unprecedented in that, to date, Jews have been prohibited from praying on the site. Chikli's move angered Muslims in Israel and around the world. The Islamist Ra'am party, a member of the coalition, issued a statement saying: "Settlers and MKs who trespass into the Al-Aqsa Mosque could lead to disturbances and a regional religious war. We will not allow this to happen – we won't tolerate prayer and the singing of Hatikvah in the mosque that is under Islamic ownership, all 35 acres."
On the occasion of Tisha B'Av, in which Jews mourn the destruction of the two temples and a variety of other calamities, some 1,000 Jews visited the Temple Mount Monday. A number of groups of Jewish pilgrims were pushed off the Temple Mount after being verbally and physically attacked by Muslims. One instance of rock-throwing was also reported.
On Sunday, Lapid called for a postponement of the evacuation of Khan al-Ahmar, warning that the move could have negative political consequences, the Ynet news site reported.
The contentious issue of the illegal Bedouin village, located between Jerusalem and the Dead Sea "has been on the table of Israeli governments for several years," Lapid wrote in a letter to Cabinet Secretary Shalom Shlomo.
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"In 2018, the [High Court of Justice] approved the demolition and evacuation of the village, but due to various political considerations on the part of previous governments, it hasn't been evacuated to this day [due] to a number of weighty domestic and international challenges," wrote Lapid, according to Ynet.
"Given that the [current] government has just been formed and hasn't had time to examine the issue in depth and independent of the previous governments' conclusions, and noting that this is a particularly sensitive issue … I request that the necessary conditions for evacuation be examined and that an in-depth study of all the legal and international ramifications of the move be conducted," he added.
Bennett, Justice Minister Gideon Sa'ar, and other members of the coalition, such as Interior Minister Ayelet Shaked and Finance Minister Avigdor Lieberman, all supported the site's evacuation in the past.
Khan al-Ahmar is one of more than 170 illegal outposts created by the Palestinian Authority and funded by the European Union, according to the NGO Regavim.
On a tour of the outpost in January 2019, then-Economy Minister Eli Cohen remarked that it "was built with the help of foreign interests that are meddling in Area C," the part of Judea and Samaria that is under full Israeli jurisdiction according to the Oslo Accords.
"The State of Israel has laws, and those laws must be obeyed," he said.
Reprinted with permission from JNS.org.
