Al-Aqsa Mosque Security Authority Prevents Israeli Settlers from Attempting to Invade

The Al-Aqsa Mosque complex. (Wikimedia Commons/Andrew Shiva)

JAKARTA - Security guards at the Al-Aqsa Mosque in East Jerusalem, Palestine, which was occupied on Friday, thwarted Israeli settlers' attempts to invade the mosque complex and sacrifice animals.

A video widely circulated on social media showed the occupation heading to Al-Aqsa Mosque, jumping over Israeli police barriers on the road to Bab Hutta, one of the mosque's gates.

The footage shows the mosque's security guards rushing to close Bab Hutta, foiling the attempted raid.

The Palestinian Wadi Hilweh Information Center said in a statement that the occupation "brought live sacrificial animals in an attempt to bring them into the mosque complex," quoted from Anadolu (2/5).

The "sacrifice" refers to animal offerings that extremist groups of the Temple are trying to introduce and slaughter inside Al-Aqsa.

There was no immediate comment from Israeli police or the Islamic Waqf Department in Jerusalem on the incident.

It is known that the Israeli police have allowed the occupation to enter the Al-Aqsa compound every day since 2003, except on Fridays and Saturdays.

Meanwhile, the Islamic Waqf Department in Jerusalem has repeatedly called for a cessation of the attacks, without a response from the Israeli authorities.

Palestinians say Israel has for decades stepped up measures aimed at Judaizing occupied East Jerusalem, including the Al-Aqsa Mosque, and erasing its Arab and Islamic identity.

Palestinians also consider occupied East Jerusalem as the capital of their future state, based on international resolutions that do not recognize Israel's occupation of the city in 1967 or its annexation in 1980.