Defending Al-Aqsa against injustice

For months, even passing observers of the Israel-Palestine conflict have been able to predict the next escalation. The conjunction of Ramadan and Passover, the anniversary of last year’s conflagration in East Jerusalem and then Gaza and the heightened tensions of the past few months made this a racing certainty. Clashes at Al-Aqsa, therefore, were neither unpredicted nor unprecedented. They were avoidable, and of course, pointless.
Above all, parties know that Jerusalem possesses an emotional hold and sacred place in the lives of Jews, Muslims and Christians. Tinker with the delicate status quo arrangements over the holy sites, especially Al-Haram Al-Sharif, and watch the subsequent explosion. Historically this has all happened before so many times, with the Wailing Wall riots of 1929, or the October 1990 massacre of 17 Palestinians after a Jewish extremist group tried to lay the cornerstone to the third temple. In September 1996, Benjamin Netanyahu played prime arsonist for the first time in Jerusalem when he opened the western wall tunnel: 70 Palestinians and 17 Israeli soldiers died in the ensuing clashes. Ariel Sharon knew precisely the consequences of his visit with hundreds of armed officers to Al-Haram Al-Sharif in September 2000, the spark that triggered the Second Intifada and his rise to being prime minister. In 2014 and 2021, escalation in Jerusalem led to wars on Gaza.
The current clashes and then incursion of Israeli armed police into Al-Haram Al-Sharif on April 15 has led to more than 150 Palestinian injuries. Jewish extremists had promised to carry out the sacrifice of a goat on what they refer to as the Temple Mount. An extremist group, “Returning to the Mount,” had offered a cash prize to anyone who was able to do this.
Palestinian Muslims from inside Israel and the Occupied Territories answered the call to defend Al-Aqsa, many of them spending the night on the platform.
Yet the Israeli authorities had made it clear they would not allow the goat sacrifice. They arrested six individuals on April 14, one of whom had a goat at his home. Most years this is attempted and thwarted. The extremists wanted to fan the flames. They got the desired reaction.
It is a key difference to the April 2021 conflagration. Then the Netanyahu administration was desperate to ramp up the tensions and provoke confrontation, even encouraging “death to Arab marches” in Jerusalem. The current government did allow more Palestinians to pray in Jerusalem during Ramadan. Demolitions were put on hold. This year, the Israeli leadership feared an escalation as it could fracture the weakened coalition and trigger elections. Earlier this month, the Naftali Bennett-led coalition lost its majority in the Knesset so it is on borrowed time.

Even with an Israeli coalition trying to avoid a crisis, violence is too embedded in the security DNA of Israeli armed forces.

Chris Doyle

Netanyahu is still firing his broadsides now as head of the opposition. He is eyeing a return to power, posing once again as “Mr. Security.” He is not deserving of the title but it might yet be a vote-winner, forcing Israeli voters to put aside concerns about his trial on corruption charges.
Israelis are traumatized. Palestinian attackers have carried out four atrocities over the past three weeks, killing 14 people. The bubble that many Israelis inhabit has truly burst. Israelis expect to live in calm, peace and security.
That attitude is very understandable but a huge fly in the ointment is the near 55-year-old occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Most Israeli Jews live their tip-top high-flying lives in the sun blissfully unaware or unwilling to consider the horrors of daily military rule on the 5.5 million Palestinians or even the systematic discrimination that several human rights groups have said amounts to the crime of apartheid.
While absorbing these fatalities in Israel, how many in Tel Aviv would understand what it means for Palestinians who have lost 16 loved ones in the past few weeks — all told 41 so far this year? Few Israelis truly understand the humdrum day-to-day oppression of Israeli occupation.
Even with an Israeli coalition trying to avoid a crisis, violence is too embedded in the security DNA of Israeli armed forces in dealing with Palestinians. More than 400 Palestinians were reportedly arrested. Ambulances were prevented from attending the wounded Palestinians. Israeli armed forces did not only enter the sacred platform of Al-Haram Al-Sharif but, as they did last year, they stormed the Al-Aqsa Mosque firing bullets, grenades and tear gas.
Perhaps wise heads and concerned regional powers will exert their influence to calm the troubled waters. It will only be a sticking plaster. The tensions are white hot, and trust between parties is decimated.
The eyes of the world often focus on Israel and Palestine but are unlikely to shift south from Ukraine right now. But that too is the challenge. Major powers, from the US to European actors, do little to stop the very same crimes in the Occupied Territories as Russia has committed in Ukraine. They may not currently be of the same in scale but are in principle — the issue of occupation, acquisition of territory through force, transfer of population, targeting of civilians and civilian infrastructure, torture, and detention without trial. The international reaction is polar opposite: For Russian aggression — sanctions and the International Criminal Court; for Israeli crimes — favorable trade deals, top-table access and eternal immunity.
Palestinians keenly feel these double standards. It feeds the anger. What does the international community expect them to do? The Israeli coalition ruled out negotiations, and maintains preconditions for future talks while insisting that Palestinians cannot set their own preconditions. All legal avenues are closed off, and worse, the Palestinian leadership is threatened should it wish to engage in this approach. Peaceful protests are met with Israeli bullets and tear gas. Use violence against Israeli soldiers in the same way Ukrainian civilians have done against Russian occupying soldiers and they are terrorists. Should extremist lone-wolf actors commit an atrocity against Israeli civilians as in recent weeks, Palestinians collectively suffer as a consequence rather than those directly responsible. Palestinians in Jenin and Nablus suffer from Israeli raids and aggressive measures currently, in the same way all Palestinians in Gaza have to endure Israeli collective punishment for the crimes of Hamas and Islamic Jihad.
The defense of Al-Aqsa is akin to the last-gasp defense of Palestinian rights. It is why the international community has to reimpose a meaningful return to the status quo agreements on the holy places. What will happen next is in the realm of the unpredictable, but this week, next month or next year Jerusalem will be exploding once more.

• Chris Doyle is director of the London-based Council for Arab-British Understanding.
Twitter: @Doylech