Photo Credit: Ahmad Jaber/flash90
Muslims pray in front of the Dome of the Rock on the compound known to Muslims as al-Haram al-Sharif and to Jews as Temple Mount.

The United States pressured Israel to open the Temple Mount to Muslims after the unprecedented one-day closure on Thursday, U.S. State Dept. spokeswoman Jen Psaki told reporters.

After expressing “concern” over “escalating tensions across Jerusalem and particularly surrounding the Haram al-Sharif/Temple Mount,” she said, “It must be reopened to Muslim worshippers….

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“We’ve been in close touch, as I’ve mentioned or alluded to, with senior Israeli, Jordanian, and Palestinian officials to try to de-escalate the situation. ….

“We support the longstanding practices regarding non-Muslim visitors to the site, to Haram al-Sharif/Temple Mount. And consistent with our respect for the status quo, we would like to see it returned to that.”

Non-Muslim visitors? How about non-Muslim worshippers, meaning Jews?

Psaki did not go any further, lest she “escalate tensions” by telling the whole truth.

The U.S. State Dept. last year, in its annual International Religious Freedom Report, stated, “[The] Israeli government policy is to grant freedom of religious expression to all, but despite an Israeli Supreme Court ruling, police continue to prevent many people from praying in the area due to what they say are ‘security considerations’

“While the government ensured limited access to the Temple Mount/Haram al-Sharif to everyone regardless of religious beliefs, only Muslims are allowed to pray at the site, although their access has been occasionally restricted due to security concerns.”

One of those who has been repeatedly restricted from ascending the Temple Mount until recently is Rabbi Yehuda Glick, who was critically wounded by an Arab terrorist Wednesday night.

Psaki condemned the attempted murder but didn’t connect the dots. Doing so would be dangerous to the State Dept’s warped view of Israel and Jewish rights.

Rabbi Glick was shot because he often visits the Temple Mount, brings hundreds of other to the holy site and openly supports the building of the Third Temple, something which the Obama administration would call an “illegal settlement.”

 


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Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu is a graduate in journalism and economics from The George Washington University. He has worked as a cub reporter in rural Virginia and as senior copy editor for major Canadian metropolitan dailies. Tzvi wrote for Arutz Sheva for several years before joining the Jewish Press.