'All the threats from Hamas won't help them, we're in charge of Jerusalem and all of the land of Israel,' the far-right minister said during his visit to the contentious holy site ■ Jordan's Foreign Ministry condemned the visit as a 'serious violation of the status quo.' Egypt called on Israel to 'immediately stop the escalation'.
National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir visited the Temple Mount on Sunday morning, and released a statement asserting Israeli control over the contentious site, which also hosts the Al-Aqsa Mosque complex.
"I'm happy to be ascending the Temple Mount, the most important site to the Jewish people," he said in a press statement. "We're in charge here."
He praised the work of police at the complex, saying that they are "proving who's in charge in Jerusalem."
"All the threats from Hamas won't help them, we're in charge of Jerusalem and all of the land of Israel."
Ben-Gvir ascended the mount in the early morning, when there were few people there, and was accompanied by his security secretary and police chief Kobi Shabtai, his aides and other police figures. He did not coordinate the trip with the Waqf, the Muslim religious trust that oversees the site.
He was joined on the trip by members of a group calling itself the Temple Mount Administration, which advocates for increased Jewish presence on the Temple Mount and maintains ties with police. Among its prominent figures are Rabbi Shimshon Elboim, whose son Haim is Ben-Gvir's spokesman, and Ben-Gvir's wife Ayala.
Palestinian Authority Deputy Prime Minister and spokesman of Mahmoud Abbas Nabil Abu Rudeineh responded to Ben-Gvir's visit "will not change the reality [at the site] and will not bring about Israeli sovereignty over the complex."
He continued, "What happened today is very dangerous, and requires the involvement of the international community, and particularly of the U.S. government, in order to protect the status quo. Harm to the Al-Aqsa Mosque is playing with fire and will cause a religious war that will affect everyone."
Jordan's Foreign Ministry issued a condemnation of the visit, calling it a "provocation" and a "serious violation of international law and the status quo on the Al-Aqsa Mosque."
A senior Israeli political source also condemned Ben-Gvir's trip, saying that the minister "allegedly exercised consideration in waiting until after Jerusalem Day, but there's no doubt that his statements this morning during his visit to the Temple Mount don't help Israel's political situation."
During the visit, he stood at the compound's eastern corner, where some Jews have begun silently praying as police have turned a blind eye, and read from his phone.
According to the status quo, Jews are forbidden from praying at the mount complex, which is considered to be the holiest site in the Jewish religion. In recent years, police have stopped enforcing the ban in the eastern corner, and have not arrested Jews for praying there – in a few cases, they have even stopped waqf authorities from filming or intervening in Jewish prayer there. Most Jewish worshippers pray there individually, silently reading from cellphones instead of prayer books.
Ben-Gvir also mentioned Israel's south and Galilee regions, which host many Arab-majority cities, towns and villages. "Jerusalem is our soul, the south and the Galilee are our spirit," he said. "We must invest, we must act there, we must be in charge of the south and the Galilee as well."
On Friday, several people were wounded by stone throwing after clashes erupted between Jewish and Palestinian worshippers in Jerusalem's Old City, Israel's Magen David Adom said.
Thursday marked the eve of Jerusalem Day, in which Israel celebrates the reunification of the city after conquering East Jerusalem from Jordan during the 1967 Six-Day War. Early that morning, hundreds of Jewish visitors made their way to the Temple Mount/Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, including Negev and Galilee Development Minister Yitzhak Wasserlauf.
This is Ben-Gvir's second visit to the compound since taking office. In January, he visited the site and stated, "Our government will not yield to Hamas' threats." The Palestinian Foreign Ministry condemned the visit at the time, describing Ben Gvir's "trespassing" on the compound as an "unprecedented provocation."