Edited by: Fern Sidman
Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir ascended the Temple Mount on Tuesday morning, despite threats from the Hamas terrorist organization that his presence at Judaism’s holiest site would be met with violent retaliation, as was reported by World Israel News.
Scheduling his visit to coincide with the 10th of Tevet, a Jewish fast day commemorating an ancient siege of Jerusalem, Ben-Gvir’s presence on the temple mount marked the first time that an Israeli government minister has gone to the site in five years, the WIN report indicated.
The visit was uneventful, with pictures and videos of Ben-Gvir surrounded by security guards and accompanied by a rabbi walking around the compound widely circulating on both Hebrew and Arabic language social media platforms, the report indicated.
WIN reported that at the conclusion of his visit, Ben-Gvir gave a statement to Hebrew language media saying that his ascension to the Temple Mount was particularly important on the heels of threats issued by terror groups.
“Our government will not surrender to threats from Hamas,” he said, according to the WIN report. “The Temple Mount is the most important place for the people of Israel. We maintain the freedom of movement for Muslims and Christians, but Jews also go up to the site, and those who make threats must be dealt with with an iron fist.”
Israel National News reported that on Sunday, Hamas threatened Israel in response to Ben-Gvir’s planned visit.
“The extremist Ben-Gvir is trying to convince his voters that he is implementing his promises by breaking into Al-Aqsa (Mosque),” said Harun Nasser El-Din, the Hamas official responsible for the issue of Jerusalem.
“We hold the government of the occupation responsible for any escalation if there is damage to Al-Aqsa (Mosque) or to our people who are clinging to Jerusalem,” the Hamas official added.
“We call on our people to protect Al-Aqsa (Mosque), and we are sure that our people will thwart all attempts to impose a new reality on Al-Aqsa (Mosque).”
WIN reported that in a statement issued to the media, the Palestinian Authority swiftly condemned Ben-Gvir’s visit, calling it an “unprecedented provocation.”
Ben-Gvir announced his intention to visit the Temple Mount on Sunday, sparking a dramatic statement from former Prime Minister Yair Lapid that “people would die” should he do so, as was reported by World Israel News.
WIN also reported that Lapid urged Netanyahu to “stop Ben-Gvir,” telling his Yesh Atid party during a faction meeting that “it is a deliberate provocation that will put lives in danger and cost lives.”
In response to news that Ben-Gvir planned to visit the compound, a Hamas spokesman declared that “the fascist settler government has begun its plan to attack our people and the Al-Aqsa Mosque, and declared war on it.”
After a meeting regarding the visit with Netanyahu on Sunday, it was widely believed that Ben-Gvir would delay ascending to the mount by several weeks, as was reported by WIN.
INN reported on Tuesday that MK Gideon Sa’ar (National Unity) mocked Netanyahu over the request, tweeting Monday: “Could it be that the prime minister of a fully right-wing government is preventing a minister in his own government from ascending the Temple Mount because of Hamas threats, despite [the fact that Ben-Gvir] was going up regularly [to the Mount] when the government in power was, according to him, ‘controlled by the Muslim Brotherhood’?”
Israeli security officials had warned the prime minister that Ben-Gvir’s visit could lead to a major escalation with terrorist forces in Judea, Samaria, and Gaza.
The Temple Mount is the holiest site for Jews, and the third holiest site in Islam. It is administered by the Jordanian Waqf, under a status quo which sees freedom of worship for Muslims at the site and Jews limited to visiting the site during particular hours and restrictive conditions.
A December 30th report on the Times of Israel web site indicated that Ben-Gvir said that he plans to continue visiting the Temple Mount as he often did before becoming a senior cabinet member.
He told the Kan public broadcaster after the 37th government’s swearing-in ceremony at the Knesset that he would “obviously” continue such visits, as was reported by the Times of Israel. The newly elected lawmaker added that he is “against racism at the Temple Mount,” referencing the long-maintained status quo at the holy site under which Muslims may pray, while Jews can only visit during limited time slots, the TOI report said.
Ben-Gvir has long been an advocate of altering the Temple Mount status quo, something the Palestinians and most of the international community vehemently reject.
In an interview conducted last Wednesday, Jordanian King Abdullah issued a warning to the new Israeli government not to cross Jordan’s “red lines” with regard to Jerusalem’s holy sites, TOI reported.
“You always have those people that will try and push that and that is a concern,” Abdullah said without mentioning names.
“If people want to get into a conflict with us, we are quite prepared. I always like to believe that ‘Let’s look at the glass half full,’ but we have set red lines and if people want to push those red lines then we will deal with that,” the king added, according to the TOI report.
Also weighing in with condemnations of the Ben-Gvir visit to the Temple Mount were Sephardic Chief Rabbi of Israel Yitzhak Yosef, as was reported Tuesday on the Israel National News web site. Rabbi Yosef wrote a letter to Ben-Gvir in which he protested the minister’s visit to the Temple Mount. He stated that religious government ministers must obey the instructions of the Chief Rabbinate forbidding all Jews from entering the Temple Mount, according to the INN report.
“I heard with sadness about your decision to go up to the Temple Mount, today, the day of the Tenth of Tevet, and by virtue of my position as the Chief Rabbi of Israel and as the successor of the Chief Rabbis throughout the generations, I feel obliged to warn you of the severity of the ban on going up to the Temple Mount, and to ask you, on behalf of the Chief Rabbinate of Israel, to refrain from going up to the Temple Mount in the future, so as not to cause the masses to err, particularly in the case of a government minister whose influence and potential to lead the public astray is greater,” Rabbi Yosef wrote to Minister Ben Gvir.
INN also reported that Rabbi Yosef cited the opinions of multiple former Chief Rabbis, including Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook, in establishing that the majority rabbinical opinion forbids visiting the Temple Mount.
At the end of his letter, the rabbi noted that “Even if there is a claim that there is some minority of rabbis who allowed you personally, it is clear that as a minister in the government of Israel you cannot act against the instructions of the Chief Rabbinate which has been consistent for generations, and what will the masses of the people say when they see a minister, an observant Jew who acts contrary to the position of the Chief Rabbinate? I hope you will find a way to correct this matter and sanctify the name of heaven.”
Earlier, the Sephardic Chief Rabbi of Jerusalem, Rabbi Shlomo Amar, also criticized Ben-Gvir for his visit to the Temple Mount, INN reported.
“Many approached me to say that today a minister came to pray on the Temple Mount, and asked what I thought. And I wondered and wondered how a minister in Israel who observes the Torah and its commandments could violate the Torah ruling of all the Chief Rabbinical Councils, which followed in the footsteps of our great rabbis of the generation and the judges of the generation … who ruled according to the law of our holy Torah – that it is completely forbidden to enter the Temple Mount,” Rabbi Amar said.
INN reported that he added: “And it is certainly not in our power to measure the boundaries of the Temple and its courtyards, and this may lead to violations the most severe prohibitions, G-d forbid.”
“And I consider it my duty as the former Chief Rabbi of Israel and the current Chief Rabbi of the Holy City and the Temple of Jerusalem to protest all those who enter the Temple Mount at this time, and to announce that there is absolutely no permit whatsoever to enter the Temple Mount.”
An official in the Prime Minister’s Office rejected claims that the visit of Ben-Gvir to the Temple Mount Tuesday morning constitutes a change in the status quo at the site, according to the INN report.
“Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is committed to strictly maintaining the status quo, without changes, on the Temple Mount. We will not be dictated to by Hamas. Under the status quo, ministers have gone up to the Temple Mount in recent years, including Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan; therefore, the claim that a change has been made in the status quo is without foundation,” the official said.
Ayala Ben-Gvir, the wife of Ben-Gvir also ascended the Temple Mount Tuesday morning after her husband’s more publicized visit, INN reported.
“I try to go up several times a month, and the Tenth of Tevet is a particularly appropriate date,” Ayala told Galai Tzahal (IDF Radio). “The Temple Mount is the holiest place for the Jewish people, when I go up I feel the holiness, I feel a warm embrace.”
INN reported that in response to the claim that the visit of her husband to the holy site would lead to violence, she said that “terrorists always try to harm Jews. In any situation, with or without a justification. Just like you don’t tell girls, ‘Don’t walk around the street because they might rape you,’ that sounds terrible and ridiculous to all of us. Like Yes, we cannot say to a Jew, ‘You are not allowed to walk around in any place in the Land of Israel because there might be someone who will get angry.'”
US Ambassador to Israel Thomas Nides chastised the Israeli government Tuesday morning, after Ben-Gvir visited the Temple Mount, according to the INN report.
Speaking with Axios reporter Barak Ravid shortly after Ben-Gvir’s visit, Nides protested any perceived changes to the status quo on the Temple Mount.
“To be very clear – we want to preserve status quo and actions that prevent that are unacceptable. We have been very clear in our conversations with the Israeli government on this issue,” Nides said.
According to a December 7th report on the Axios.com web site, the White House held a high-level meeting to discuss its approach toward the new Israeli government and the possibility of not engaging with some of its “ultranationalist” ministers, two U.S. officials told Axios.
Axios reported that a U.S. Congressional Research Service report updated not long after the Israeli elections said the rise of the ultranationalist Religious Zionism faction as a likely Netanyahu coalition partner “has triggered debate about the implications for Israel’s democracy, its ability to manage tensions with Arabs and Palestinians, and its relations with the United States and other countries.”
Ben-Gvir and Smotrich “openly support policies to favor Israel’s Jewish citizens over its Arab citizens and annex the West Bank,” the report added, as was reported by Axios.
Among the issues discussed were guidelines for engagement with the new government, especially its far-right ministers, according to the two U.S. officials.
Axios also reported that while no decisions have been made, U.S. ambassador to Israel Tom Nides hinted in early December that the Biden administration may not engage directly with Ben-Gvir and Smotrich.
In an interview with the Israeli army radio in December, Nides was asked several times whether he or other Biden administration officials would work with the two far-right politicians, according to the Axios report. He answered by saying: “We are going to work with Prime Minister Netanyahu.”
Another issue that was discussed at the White House meeting was which core interests and demands regarding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, human rights and rule of law the U.S. needs to focus on in its engagement with the new Israeli government, U.S. officials told Axios.
On Tuesday, the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), called on the Biden administration to strongly condemn a “provocation” by Israel’s new government targeting Al-Aqsa Mosque, one of Islam’s holiest sites, according to a press release sent to the media.
“Benjamin Netanyahu’s national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, is a far-right extremist, a genocidal racist and a terrorist sympathizer,” said CAIR National Deputy Director Edward Ahmed Mitchell. “The Biden administration should strongly condemn the Netanyahu government’s attempts to incite racial and religious conflict at one of the most sacred and sensitive places in the world.”
He added that last month, CAIR called on the Biden administration to stand up to a new Israeli government composed of openly racist and genocidal far-right politicians.
(Sources: WorldIsraelNews.com, israelnationalnews.com, Axios.com, TimesofIsrael.com)
