RAMALLAH, West Bank, 26 July 2007 — Jerusalem’s Planning and Construction Committee yesterday began discussing an alternative to the controversial Al-Magharibah Bridge project near Al-Aqsa Mosque compound.
The original plan for the bridge, which leads from the old city’s Al-Magharibah Gate and the Al-Buraq Wall (Western Wall) to the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound where the Al-Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock are located, raised demonstrations in the Arab-Islamic world when it was presented in February, fearing that it would damage the compound.
Some Israeli and Palestinian archaeologists and architects also expressed concern that the bridge would damage antiquities or block the view of the compound. According to Israeli sources, the new plan is very different from the previous one.
It shortens the bridge, which will now follow the route of the existing ramp to the Al-Magharibah Gate, instead of beginning in the area of the Southern Wall Archaeological Park, where some experts feared that it would block the view of the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound.
The plan shows that the bridge will consist of a wooden walkway bordered by metal, with two-meter-high iron railings, as required by the Israeli police. The number of pylons supporting it will be reduced from seven to four. The height of the pylons will not exceed half a meter, and they will be placed on platforms in spaces excavated by the Israeli Antiquities Authority during its excavations dig, allowing the antiquities to be restored and protected.
The sources said that the planners mapped the archaeological finds along the bridge’s path and found spaces in which the pylons could be placed without damaging the antiquities. However, although the general route of the bridge is known, the Jerusalem’s municipality still does not know how it will look.
In another development, extreme right-wing Israeli activists and settlers said they intended to form a new settling outpost today in the West Bank, with the support of at least nine right-wing action groups. The area for the new settlement is adjacent to Efrat settlement, which is located south of Jerusalem between Bethlehem and Hebron. The right-wing activists intend to build the new settlement on Eitam Hill.
“The new settlement of Eitam is the first step of a five-stage plan to lift the chokehold that the (Israeli) cabinet has imposed on the settlement in Judea and Samaria (West Ban),” the organizers of the event said.
