DaysofPal – Researcher specializing in Jerusalem affairs, Ziad Ibhis, has warned that the coming Friday could become “the most dangerous Friday for Al-Aqsa Mosque since its occupation,” citing plans led by extremist Temple groups in coordination with the Israeli government and police to impose new realities inside the holy site.
In press statements, Ibhis explained that the seriousness of this year’s developments stems from the coincidence of the so-called “Hebrew anniversary of the occupation of Jerusalem” with Friday, May 15, which also marks the 78th anniversary of the Palestinian Nakba. According to him, this overlap allows Temple groups to attempt a “historic precedent” by enabling settlers to storm Al-Aqsa Mosque on a Friday.
He noted that, in recent years, the occasion has evolved into a major platform for displaying “Zionist sovereignty” over the mosque through the raising of Israeli flags and the performance of Talmudic rituals inside its courtyards, including collective prostration rituals.
New Planned Incursions
Ibhis said the Temple groups are first seeking to carry out a “compensatory” incursion on Thursday if they are unable to enter the mosque on Friday itself. He added that the broader objective is to eventually impose Friday incursions either before or after Friday prayers in order to establish the practice as a permanent precedent.
He further explained that the plans extend beyond Friday incursions alone and include attempts to create new time slots for settler entries outside the currently established periods, such as after the Asr or Maghrib prayers. Such measures, he warned, could pave the way for extending the duration of incursions in the future and deepening the policy of temporal division at Al-Aqsa Mosque.
According to Ibhis, the Israeli authorities are attempting through these measures to entrench a formula that places Jewish and Zionist national occasions on equal footing with Islamic religious occasions inside the mosque, thereby reinforcing, under the Israeli narrative, what is presented as an “equal right” for settlers to enter the compound.
He stressed that confronting these plans requires intensified Palestinian presence at Al-Aqsa Mosque, encouraging worshippers to travel to the site and turning it into the focus of broader popular mobilization both within Palestine and abroad.
Ibhis added that Israeli authorities have shifted from a policy of closing the mosque during Fridays and Islamic occasions to attempting to impose settler incursions on Fridays themselves. He argued that the current developments will shape the future of attacks on Al-Aqsa Mosque and define the nature of the confrontation surrounding it in the coming phase.
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