Palestinian Foreign Ministry rejects Israeli clarification of events at Al Aqsa

AMMAN — The Palestinian Foreign Ministry on Wednesday considered a clarification offered by the Israeli Foreign Ministry’s spokesperson pertaining to the interception of Jordanian ambassador to Tel Aviv Ghassan Al Majali while he was entering Al Aqsa Mosque/Al Haram Al Sharif, as "illegal, mere wordplay and contradictory", and rejected the statement. 

Political adviser to Palestinian Foreign Minister Ambassador Ahmed Al Deek said that the Israeli spokesperson's remarks on the Israeli forces’ responsibility to enforce the law at Al Aqsa are "a flagrant violation of the historical, political and legal status quo in the mosque".

He said that the "the lack of prior coordination" argument that was offered in justification of the incident is also an attempt to alter to the legal status of the mosque.

The Jordan-run Jerusalem Awqaf and Aqsa Affairs Department is the sole authority able to supervise its affairs and manage entries to the site, he said, stressing that Muslims do not need prior permission to enter the mosque. 

The clarification reflects the occupation authorities' persistence in targeting Christian and Islamic holy sites, foremost of which is Al Aqsa Mosque, as it falls within the occupation's ongoing measures to impose a temporal and spatial division of Al Aqsa, Deek noted, according to the Jordan News Agency, Petra.