The Department of Islamic Endowments in the city of Jerusalem revealed that stones continued to fall from the pillars of the Al-Aqsa Mosque, specifically under the roofed Qibli prayer hall, without knowing the reasons so far.
The Department is still calling on the Israeli occupation police to send a specialized technical team to examine the excavations that are taking place at the site in the vicinity of the southern wall of Al-Aqsa Mosque, but the Israeli police are reluctant to allow this.
The Council of Endowments, Islamic Affairs, and Holy Sanctuaries, which is the supervising authority of the Endowments Department in the city of Jerusalem, confirmed that it is following with great seriousness the excavations carried out by Israel in the vicinity of Al-Aqsa Mosque.
The Israeli Antiquities Authority and the Settlement Justice Society have been carrying out excavations, described as suspicious and mysterious, in the vicinity of the mosque, especially from the southern and western sides adjacent to the external foundation of the mosque in the areas of the Al-Buraq Wall and the Umayyad palaces.
The number of excavations around and below Al-Aqsa has exceeded 100 since Israel occupied the eastern part of the city in 1967. These excavations have caused cracks and demolition in the walls, floors, and buildings of Al-Aqsa and Old Jerusalem, in addition to the systematic destruction of many antiquities.
Four days after the occupation of Jerusalem, Israeli bulldozers began demolishing buildings in the Muslim Quarter and in the Al-Buraq Wall Square and Al-Mughrabi Quarter, in order to start excavations around and below Al-Aqsa Mosque.
At the end of 1967, the occupation began excavations along seventy meters below the southern wall of Al-Aqsa Mosque, that is, behind Al-Aqsa Mosque, the Islamic Museum and the honorary minaret.
The depth of these excavations reached 14 meters, which led to the cracking of the southern wall and the building of the Al-Aqsa Mosque adjacent to it.
In 1969, excavations were carried out with a length of 80 meters. They started from where the first southern excavations had ended and extended to the Mughrabi Gate and passed down the 14 Islamic buildings belonging to the Honorary Zawiya.
Between 1973 and 1974, excavations penetrated the southern wall of the Temple Mount, and entered the lower corridors of Al-Aqsa Mosque in four locations. The depths of these excavations reached more than 13 meters, which exposed the southern wall to the danger of cracking and collapsing.
The director of the map department in the Orient House in Jerusalem, Khalil Tafakji, said “This city has been Arab and Islamic since the Roman period until the Ottoman period, and accordingly, there is nothing related to the Jewish heritage. he occupation is trying to prove the opposite through excavations.”
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