Israeli Govt Crisis Deepens after Closing of Major Mosque

Raam, the first independent Arab party to join an Israeli government, said it was suspending its involvement until further notice, after an emergency meeting by the leadership council of an Islamic movement that oversees the party.

The decision has no immediate effect on the government: The Israeli Parliament is on recess until May 8, by which time Raam may have decided to rejoin the government. But if Raam makes its decision permanent within the next three weeks, it would give opposition lawmakers a 64-56 majority in the 120-seat Parliament — enough seats to vote to dissolve the body and send Israel to its fifth election in three years.

Raam’s move highlights the fraying tightrope that Naftali Bennett, the prime minister, must walk in order to keep his ideologically diverse coalition together. The coalition formed in June, with little uniting its eight right-wing, left-wing, centrist and Arab parties beyond a desire to avoid a fifth election and to prevent Benjamin Netanyahu, then the prime minister, from holding on to power.

The government began to teeter this month when a right-wing lawmaker, Idit Silman, quit the coalition, saying it did not adequately represent Zionist and Jewish values. Any concessions to Raam may prompt other right-wing coalition members to follow Silman into opposition.

The move by Raam follows several recent confrontations between Israeli police and Muslims at the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in Jerusalem, a site sacred in both Islam and Judaism and known to Jews as the Temple Mount. The tensions were deeply embarrassing to Raam; as a coalition member, it was seen by its supporters as being party to transgressions against a mosque considered the third-holiest site in Islam.

Clashes between Israeli police officers and Palestinian stone-throwers broke out Friday morning at the mosque compound, injuring more than 150 Palestinians and several officers; leading to more than 400 arrests; and prompting police to storm the largest mosque within the complex, which contains several places of worship.

Tensions escalated further Sunday morning, when Israeli officers stopped Muslim worshippers from entering the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound during a scheduled visit by Jewish worshippers and foreign tourists, who are permitted to enter each morning Sunday through Thursday. The unusual move led to brief clashes at the compound and in nearby side streets, in which at least 18 Palestinians were arrested, some of them for throwing stones at passing buses and for punching and kicking religious Jews in a nearby alley. At least 17 Palestinians were injured, five of them by rubber-tipped bullets fired by police, according to the Palestinian Red Crescent, an emergency medical group.

The developments compounded the tensions in Jerusalem, which have risen sharply in recent weeks after an unusually deadly wave of Arab attacks in Israel killed 14 people and after an ensuing Israeli crackdown in the occupied West Bank killed at least 15.

Tensions are expected to rise further in the coming days because of the rare convergence between Ramadan and Passover, which began Friday and is driving more followers of both Islam and Judaism to the Al-Aqsa compound.

The violence Sunday began after police, seeking to prevent contact between Muslims and Jews who were about to enter the compound during regular visiting hours, confined Muslims who were already inside it to small parts of the site.

Earlier, Palestinians had gathered near the entrance to the site used by non-Muslims, blocking part of the route that is usually used by Jews to pray discreetly near the location of an ancient Jewish temple considered the holiest place in Judaism. Photographs published by a Palestinian news outlet indicated that stones had been stockpiled elsewhere on the route.

Police struck some Palestinians with batons and denied access to Muslims who were still outside the site.

The Israeli government initially denied restricting Muslims’ access, but later a spokeswoman acknowledged that they were blocked for safety reasons for a “period of time,” without specifying how long. Reporters for The New York Times witnessed dozens of Muslims being turned away throughout the morning at two major entrances to the complex, as Jews and foreigners, including a Times reporter, continued to enter freely.

Police then provided Jewish worshippers with an armed escort as they walked around the perimeter of the compound. Tourists and some journalists were restricted to a more limited area.

Clashes later broke out in the side streets around the mosque compound, where Palestinians shouted, “With our souls, with our blood, we sacrifice for Al-Aqsa.” A reporter for the Times saw several police officers use batons to strike a group of chanting Palestinians who had been standing still outside the complex.

Video circulated by police Sunday showed two other episodes in which a group of Arab men punched and kicked three religious Jews and — in a separate episode — threw stones from a rooftop.

Police also disabled the loudspeakers at the mosque, after Palestinians tried to use the sound system to call people to the site, said Sheikh Omar al-Kiswani, a senior cleric there.

Omar described the police actions as “a siege.” In a statement, police said that their aim was to preserve freedom of worship for all religions and that they had acted only against people who “defile and desecrate the holy places and try to harm innocent civilians and security forces.”

Other Palestinians locked themselves in the largest mosque in the compound, as police patrolled outside. That standoff ended late in the morning, after police began letting some Muslims into the compound and withdrew to allow the Palestinians within the mosque to leave. They emerged cheering, some setting off fireworks and one carrying a green flag associated with Hamas, the Islamist militant group that runs the Gaza Strip.

Tensions are often high at the complex in Jerusalem’s Old City. But they are particularly tense at the moment because of the overlap of Ramadan, Passover and Easter, the first since 1991.

Muslims consider efforts by some Jewish activists to pray furtively at the site to be a provocation because they violate the long-standing Israeli policy of allowing Jews to visit but not pray. They also fear that Jewish prayer there will give momentum to campaigns by small extremist groups to build a new Jewish temple at the site.

Many Muslims have also been angered by recent efforts by extremist Jews to enter the compound with young goats to make Passover sacrifices. Police said last week that they had arrested some activists who were planning such a sacrifice, and officers intercepted a Jew carrying a goat near the compound Friday, confiscating the animal.

Jews are split on whether they should pray on Temple Mount.

Last week, one of the chief rabbis of Israel, David Lau, released a statement saying it was forbidden for Jews to set foot there, a stance that many chief rabbis have held since 1967, when Israel captured the site from Jordan. Many Jews believe that by entering the site, they risk stepping on some of the most sacred areas of the ancient Jewish temple.

The clashes Sunday followed a more intense incident Friday, when Israeli riot police officers, firing rubber-tipped bullets and stun grenades, stormed the main mosque in the compound to detain hundreds of Palestinians, many of whom had been throwing stones at them. More than 150 people were hurt.

Similar clashes at the mosque last year contributed to the outbreak of an 11-day war between Israel and militants in Gaza led by Hamas.

This year, however, both Israel and Hamas have signalled that they are not seeking an escalation. Khaled Meshaal, a senior Hamas official, said Saturday that both sides had conveyed through Qatari officials that they did not want a new conflagration.

But Islamic Jihad, another militant group in Gaza, said Sunday that recent tensions at the mosque would lead to an “all-out confrontation.”_The New York Times