Ramallah: At least 20 Palestinians were wounded and a dozen arrested after fierce clashes erupted on Wednesday between Israel’s special forces and Palestinian civilian guards and volunteers on Al Aqsa Holy Compound.
At least a 1,000-strong force and sniper squad stormed the compound via Al Magahribah and Al Silsilah gates before locking the compound’s other gates, and attacked the students who spent their night guarding the third holy site of Muslims,” said Shaikh Omar Al Kiswani, Director General of Al Aqsa compound.
“The occupation forces surrounded the Palestinian students in Al Qibli and Al Marwani Mosques after evacuating the rest of the area’s halls and courts and fired tear gas and rubber coated bullets,” he told Gulf News,
The site was blocked after the clashes labelled as the fiercest since 1990.
Hundreds of Palestinian volunteers, guards of the compound and students from Sharia schools have spent the past four nights protecting the site from the possible attack by colonists who called for a ‘group pilgrimage’ to Al Haram Al Qudsi Al Sharif, which Israelis call Temple Mount, to mark the Jewish Passover festival which is marked till April 21.
Shaikh Al Kiswani said that Israel deployed the forces at all gates of the compound, where none of the Palestinian Muslims was permitted entry, which aggravated the already tense situation and tens of buses carrying Palestinians from the 1948 areas arrived at the site to protect the holy compound.
He said only men above 50 years were allowed into the mosque at the time of prayers after the occupation forces had seized their identity cards at the gates instructing them to exit once the prayers were completed.
“Israeli buses have been transporting colonists from Hebron and other parts of the West Bank to Al Aqsa compound for their religious rituals,” he said.
Tensions have been running high between the Palestinians and colonists after the death of a colonist near the Tarqoumia Checkpoint of Hebron on Monday.
Israel has announced that a Palestinian who does not belong to any armed faction opened fire at a vehicle killing an intelligence officer Baruch Mizrachi. The occupation forces have sealed the village of Ednah of Hebron in search for the attacker. Mizrachi is a resident of the Israeli colony of Kiryat Arba’a, near Hebron. In response to the killing, the colonists called for a group pilgrimage to Al Aqsa to provoke the Palestinians.
