It is clear that opposition to the ability
of Jews to peacefully pray on the holiest site in Judaism and the site
of the first two Jewish Temples, namely the Temple Mount, is prompted by
the virulent antisemitism of the Palestinian Authority and the Kingdom
of Jordan. Their opposition is based upon the antisemitic view that
there is no Jewish connection to the site.
The previous uniform Muslim view of the
Temple Mount was expressed in 1925 by the Supreme Muslim Council in
their published guide to the Temple Mount for tourists. It said the
site’s “identity with the site of Solomon’s Temple is beyond dispute.
This too is the spot, according to the universal belief, on which ‘David
built there an altar to the Lord, and offered burnt offerings and peace
offerings.’” The guide further states that Muslim rule over the Temple
Mount began in 637 CE, the “year the Caliph Omar occupied Jerusalem.” In
1925, it seems, Muslim leaders understood that the Jews were the
indigenous people of the Land of Israel and that the Temple Mount is
Jewish.
Today, Jordan and the P.A. falsely claim
that not just the Al-Aqsa Mosque, but the entire Temple Mount and the
Western Wall are holy to Muslims and only Muslims. This claim is
compounded by the antisemitic canard that the Temple Mount is not holy
to Jews, enunciated in notorious fashion by P.A. chairman Yasser Arafat
on July 17, 2000 at the Camp David Summit.
Arafat shocked President Bill Clinton when
he denied that the Jewish Temples were ever on the Temple Mount.
Israeli Ambassador to the U.S. Danny Ayalon, who was present, recounted
that Clinton was furious and devastated. He yelled at Arafat: “Well, let
me tell you something, Mr. chairman: When my messiah Jesus Christ
walked on the Temple Mount, he didn’t see any mosques. He didn’t see
Al-Aqsa. He didn’t see the Dome of the Rock. He saw only the Jewish
Temple.”
The Muslim Waqf on the Temple Mount has
spent considerable time desecrating the Jewish holy site in attempt to
destroy artifacts establishing the Jewish connection to the site.
Yisrael Medad wrote: “The Waqf Islamic religious trust has altered times
of entry and prohibited Shabbat visits for Jews. … The Waqf created new
holiday periods, planted tree orchards, paved over new pathways, built
outdoor prayer platforms and constructed three new mosques on the Temple
Mount.”
In an article in the Sept. 2021 issue of Commentary,
Rabbi Meir Soloveitchik wrote: “The hard truth is that in the past 54
years since the miraculous moment when Jews returned to ancient
Jerusalem, the sacred city has itself been rebuilt—but the destruction
of the remnants of the Temple has gotten worse. The Waqf has destroyed
much archeological evidence of the Temple that once was there, and many
Palestinian leaders have denied that the Temple stood there in the first
place.”
Tayseer al-Tamimi, former chief justice of
the P.A. Religious Court, said: “The blessed Aqsa Mosque is Islamic and
belongs to Muslims alone … and the Jews have no right to it … or the
right to pray in any part of it.” He added that the “Al-Aqsa Mosque
includes all its courtyards … and specifically its Western Wall.”
P.A. Minister of Religious Affairs Mahmoud
al-Habbash has also asserted that Al-Aqsa “will not be shared with
anyone, and no one besides Muslims will pray in it.” In Dec. 2021,
Habbash stated that the Western Wall is “an authentic part of Al-Aqsa
Mosque only.”
Jordanian Prime Minister Bisher
Al-Khasawneh gave his full support to attacks on Jewish worshippers at
the Western Wall. At a parliamentary session, he said: “I congratulate
all Palestinians and all Jordanian Islamic Waqf workers who stand as
tall as a turret, and those who throw stones at pro-Zionists
[worshippers at the Western Wall] who defile the Al-Aqsa Mosque.”
Just a few years ago, Jordan asked UNESCO’s World Heritage Committee to reclassify the Western Wall as a Muslim site.
In the Talmud, the destruction of the
Second Temple that we just mourned on Tish B’Av is blamed on the actions
of Rabbi Zechariah Ben Avkulas. He was criticized for not speaking up
when he witnessed a man named Bar Kamtza being thrown out of a party. In
revenge for his humiliation, Bar Kamtza went to the Roman emperor and
told him the Jews would not accept the emperor’s sheep as a sacrifice.
Then, Bar Kamtza put a blemish on the sacrifice to make it unacceptable
according to the Torah.
The rabbis wanted to allow the sacrifice
to proceed in order to avoid angering the emperor, which they believed
was acceptable because a Torah prohibition can be violated to save a
life and the Temple. They rightly feared that the emperor would murder
Jews and destroy the Temple if they did not permit the sacrifice.
However, this time Zechariah Ben Avkulas
spoke up. He opposed the sacrifice and prevailed. As a result, the
emperor was incensed, which led him to destroy the Second Temple,
murdering many Jews and ending all sacrifices.
Many rabbis, including some who spoke up
this past week, hold that since all Jews today are considered ritually
impure, they are not allowed to go up to the Temple Mount because it may
violate the holiness of the site. But they fail to take into
consideration that the Israeli government’s agreement with this view
since 1967 has led to a far greater desecration of the Temple Mount.
Furthermore, Maimonides, the great
codifier of Jewish law, whose picture is displayed in the U.S. House of
Representatives, apparently did not believe it was forbidden to go up to
the Temple Mount and pray there, since he did so on the sixth day of
the Hebrew month of Cheshvan with his father, brother and Rabbi Yaphet.
Rabbi Berel Wein famously said that God
showed which rabbis were correct about whether Zionism would be
successful by the many miracles that led to Israel’s establishment and
survival. God’s hand is also apparent in regard to the Mount.
The most famous ascension to the Mount
since 1967 was that of then-Likud leader Ariel Sharon. He visited the
site on Sept. 28, 2000 to show his opposition to then-Prime Minister
Ehud Barak’s offer to give up sovereignty over the Temple Mount to the
P.A. Within six months of the visit, in March 2001, Sharon became prime
minister. His friend, journalist Uri Dan, wrote that it was Sharon’s
visit to the Mount that catapulted him to head of government.
It is astonishing that, in this day, it is considered legitimate to
oppose the freedom of the Jewish people to peacefully pray at the
holiest Jewish site. Israeli ministers are right to try to end that
discrimination and the U.S. should stop opposing Jewish prayer in order
to appease the antisemitism of the P.A. and Jordan.
1 comment:
Since Islam didn't exist before the 7th Century A.D. it would have been really strange if Yeshua ben Yoseph WOULD have seen mosques in Jerusalem.
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