Al-Aqsa Opened After Long Closure.. Settlers Escalate with Dangerous Intrusions

SadaNews - The Jerusalem Governorate stated that there is a serious escalation affecting the historical and legal status of Al-Aqsa Mosque, constituting a blatant provocation to the feelings of Muslims in Jerusalem, Palestine, and the entire world. This comes as settlers stormed Al-Aqsa Mosque this morning, marking the implementation of the new extension for morning intrusion hours, which started at 6:30 AM instead of the previous 7:00 AM.

This follows the announcement by what are known as "Temple Organizations" extending the intrusion times by an additional half hour, making them from 6:30 AM to 11:30 AM, and then from 1:30 PM to 3:00 PM, totaling six and a half hours daily.

This extension reflects an acceleration in imposing new realities inside Al-Aqsa Mosque and consolidating the policy of temporal division, especially with its reopening after a 40-day closure.

Settler intrusions into Al-Aqsa Mosque date back to 2003, beginning on a daily basis under the protection of occupation forces, before transitioning in 2008 to a more organized phase by allocating specific times for them, which initially lasted three hours in the morning only, from 7:00 AM to 10:00 AM. Since then, these times have gradually expanded year after year, as part of a systematic policy to impose a new reality inside the mosque, reaching today about six and a half hours daily, within the context of entrenching temporal division and the effort to fully impose it.

The Jerusalem Governorate indicated that about 3,000 worshippers were able to perform the Fajr prayer in Al-Aqsa Mosque, after forty days of its closure, despite the strict occupation measures that included identity checks and preventing several youths from entering, alongside assaults on some worshippers at the gates and attempts to dissuade them from the mosque courtyards.