And yet.
It may be true that for religious or sentimental reasons, one should refrain from going up on the Har HaBayit, even on those parts that may be permissible Halachically, as above. Nevertheless, the ONLY reason that we ought to refrain from going up is because WE have decided not to go there, for our own reasons; NOT because of what the Waqf, or the murderous, crocodile tear Islamic fanatics say. They must be told, in no uncertain terms, that Jews have absolute, inalienable, and permanent ownership over that place that is and was sacred to us, thousands of years before Mohamed supposedly (it is not even agreed upon within Islamic doctrine) ascended to wherever he went after leaving this life from there. It is OUR Temple Mount (which they deny), not theirs. And if Jews, following the Halachic authorities who permit prayer there, wish to exercise their rights, they must absolutely be allowed to do so.
I heard a great Rav in Israel once say that General Motta Gur was a prophet, though he did not know it. In the heat of the Six Day War, when the IDF successfully, and unexpectedly, captured the Temple Mount and the Old City of Jerusalem, the whole world heard the General exclaim over the radio “Har HaBayit Biyadeinu!!! HarHaBayit Biyadeinu!!!” The Temple Mount is in our Hands!!!. Motta Gur meant that we had won the battle and restored Jewish sovereignty to its rightful position for the first time in 2,000 years. Most unfortunately, Moshe Dayan, despite the overwhelming evidence of the destruction and debasement of every Jewish synagogue and Holy site in the Old city that had been captured in 1948, at a time when Israel could have been fully justified in dynamiting the mosques on the Har HaBayit in return, instead granted full legal rights to the Waqf to have say over everything in that compound. What an unforgivably tragic decision!!! What Dayan did not realize was that the Har HaBayit was now truly Biyadeinu…in our hands, to do with as WE, not them, decide.
Nevertheless, the Har HaBayit is still Biyadeinu. It is in our hands, through our actions, that its fate will be ultimately decided. Certainly, in our actions of Torah, Tefillah, Teshuvah, and Mitzvos, to allow us to have the zechus (merit) in the eyes of Hashem to fully restore us to its sovereignty. But it is also Biyadeinu, in our actions as a proud Nation that will recognize that we are not any longer supposed to take the stance that we did the thousands of years of Golus, and meekly submit to the will of the Nations around us. That, Baruch Hashem, with the restoration of our People to Our Land, a new era has begun in which we will no longer tolerate their anti-semitism, and we will proudly stand up for our rights and our security, and our Holy Places.
This article is long enough already, I will please G-d write a follow-up about my understanding of what our present relationship with the nations of the world ought to be in general, post 1948. But clearly it is time that we all acknowledge publicly that which the overwhelming majority of the Jewish people today know to be true – a new era has begun. When we are attacked, we are to react not as the helpless victims of old who had no strength or rights of our own, but as a proud Nation at War, who will not tolerate the violence of those who seek to harm them.
We, too, in America have a role to play. We have to know that there is a war going on, and call it as such. We must protest when the American Administration relentlessly pressures Israel to give more and more concessions to those who will not even recognize our right to exist. We must speak up when and where we can to defend the rights of Jews not only for self defense, but to act as a nation at war, and give no quarter to our evil enemies. And most of all, we must daven to Hashem that once again he give us תשועה גדולה ופורקן a great salvation and redemption, as the many are given over to the hands of the few , and the evildoers into the hands of the righteous.