Ramallah: The Al Jaber family in the city of Hebron, in the southern West Bank, have disowned one of their members for welcoming a hardline Jewish rabbi into his home.
Mohammad Saber Al Jaber was arrested for questioning by the Palestinian General Intelligence after he played host to far-right Israeli Orthodox rabbi Yehuda Glick to mark the Eid Al Adha festival.
The family declared their unanimous rejection of Al Jaber by putting up announcements on the walls of Hebron’s mosques. Copies have also been posted on social media sites. The family said the bad reputation Al Jaber suffered after he received the far-right rabbi should not be allowed to affect the whole clan.
The family avowed in a statement that they would not even bury Mohammad when he died. They said they had warned him about his previous collusion with Israelis, but the Glick episode was the final straw. The mere idea of meeting Israelis was treason and an absolute betrayal of Palestine, they added.
The Al Jaber clan had earlier asked the Palestinian security forces to arrest Mohammad and interrogate him about his regular meetings with Israelis. But the Palestinian Preventive Security pulled out of apprehending him when they were told Mohammad was a member of an inter-religious dialogue committee.
Glick, a member of the Israeli Knesset (parliament), is infamous as a leader of groups who raid Al Haram Al Sharif in occupied East Jerusalem, campaigning for expansion of Jewish access to the holy site. In late October 2014, Glick suffered serious injuries in an assassination attempt in occupied East Jerusalem by a 32-year-old former prisoner in Israeli jails, Moataz Hijazi.
Glick is founder and chairman of the Temple Mount Faithful, a far-right group that seeks to rebuild a Jewish temple in the Al Haram Al Sharif compound, which houses Al Aqsa Mosque, the third holiest site in Islam, and the Dome of the Rock.
Israel captured and annexed East Jerusalem, including Al Haram Al Sharif, in 1967 in a move that was never recognised internationally. Israel declared Jerusalem as its undivided and eternal capital, while the Palestinians demand that occupied East Jerusalem should be the capital of their future Palestinian independent state. The status and fate of occupied East Jerusalem is believed to be the reason for the total collapse of peace talks between the Palestinians and Israelis in April 2014.
Occupied East Jerusalem has been systematically targeted by the Israelis in a bid to oust its indigenous Palestinian residents and replace them with Israeli colonists. About 300,000 Palestinians currently live in the holy city.
