Khaled Yacoub Oweis
The National / August 28, 2024
Foreign Minister says proposal for tours to Islamic holy site could provide the spark in an ‘explosive situation’
Jordan has condemned a plan by an Israeli ministry to fund Jewish visits to the Al-Aqsa Mosque complex, the holy site central to the Palestinian struggle for Jerusalem, and called for UN Security Council action to curb what it labelled illegal Israeli measures on an “explosive” issue.
Israel’s Ministry of Heritage announced plans on Tuesday to finance tours for Jews and tourists to the compound, which contains Al-Aqsa Mosque, one of Islam’s holiest sites. The Israeli police had approved the plans, according to public broadcaster KAN.
The announcement came a day after Israeli Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir said he “would put an Israeli flag” in the complex and build a synagogue there if he could. The UAE and Egypt, which has a formal peace treaty with Israel, condemned his remarks.
They were followed late on Tuesday by Ayman al-Safadi, Jordan’s Foreign Affairs Minister, who said on X that the UN Security Council must act to “stop the illegal Israeli measures that violate the historical and legal status quo at occupied Jerusalem’s holy sites … before it is too late”.
Jordan, one of only two Arab countries to have signed a peace treaty with Israel, claims custodianship of Al-Aqsa and other holy sites in occupied East Jerusalem.
The complex is administered by an Islamic trust funded and controlled by Jordan in a security arrangement with Israel after they signed the peace treaty in 1994. Under the arrangement, Jews are not allowed to pray in the grounds of the compound but can pray at the nearby Western Wall.
The compound is a site considered holy by Muslims, Jews and Christians, and is a focal point of Israeli-Palestinian tensions.
Al-Safadi said “the situation [in Palestine] is already explosive. The hate-driven ideology enabling the designs to change the identity of the mosque will provide the spark. The consequences will be dangerous.”
He urged the UN Security Council to intervene, saying it “must adopt a binding resolution preventing Israel from further violations and escalation at Al-Aqsa Mosque”.
Jordan’s custodianship is at the centre of its foreign policy in support of the Palestinians and is a major domestic plank for King Abdullah in a country where a large proportion of the population are of Palestinian origin.
Jordanian authorities have allowed limited anti-Israeli demonstrations since the war in Gaza broke out on October 7, but have banned assemblies near the border with Israel, stoking accusations on social media that the kingdom was not doing enough in support of the Palestinians.
In a separate statement, Jordan’s Foreign Ministry said the proposed tours into Al-Aqsa constituted illegal incursions and that financing them would be an “escalatory step by the extremist Israeli government, reflecting systematic Israeli policy” to change the status quo at the mosque.
There has been no official Israeli endorsement of the proposal or the statements by Ben-Gvir.
Iran-backed militant group Hamas has said it carried out its October 7 attack on Israel in defence of Al-Aqsa. Israel responded to that assault with its invasion of the Gaza Strip, now in its 11th month.
Jordan has historically owed its outsize role in Al-Aqsa to its location across the Jordan River from Israel and the dynamics of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.
Its peace treaty with Israel does not specifically mention Jordanian custodianship of Al-Aqsa, but scholars in the kingdom have argued that the spirit of the agreement is predicated on Israel respecting the status quo that existed before the 1967 Middle East War, when the kingdom lost the West Bank and East Jerusalem to Israel.
Khaled Yacoub Oweis – Jordan Correspondent, Amman
