Clashes break out in Jerusalem over access to contested shrine Six people are killed as tensionsmount over Israeli metal detectors
Palestinian worshipers and Israeli police clashed Friday outside Jerusalem’s Old City over restricted access to a contested shrine, as thousands of Muslims gathered in the area for weekly prayers.
Tensions were high as young men outside the Old City walls battled the police with rocks and improvised Molotov cocktails, while officers responded with water cannons and threw stun grenades into the crowds.
A Palestinian man was shot dead by an Israeli settler in Ras al- Amud, a neighborhood southeast of the Old City, Palestinian media reported. An image of a man wearing a skullcap on a balcony and holding an automatic weapon circulated on social media.
Israeli police and Palestinian officials confirmed a second and third Palestinian were killed in clashes near the Old City later in the day.
More violence came at the end of a day of deadly clashes over tensions at the major Jerusalem shrine. Three Israelis died in a Palestinian attack inside aWest Bank settlement.
Tensions have been rising for days as Palestinians protested Israeli authorities’ decision to install metal detectors at the entry gates to the Esplanade of the Mosques. Muslim men under the age of 50 were barred from entering the Old City, but the restrictions do not apply to residents.
The clashes Friday erupted amid Palestinian protests over the metal detectors at the holy site known to Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary and to Jews as the Temple Mount. The compound houses the Al Aqsa and Dome of the Rock mosques.
Clashes were also reported at the Qalandia checkpoint between Jerusalem and the West Bank city of Ramallah, while protests in solidarity with Palestinians were held in Bethlehem, Tulkaram, Jericho and Hebron.
Israeli media reported about 3,000 Palestinians were protesting in West Bank cities later Friday.
The metal detectors were installed this week after an attack by IsraeliArab gunmen at the shrine one week ago left two Israeli policemen dead.
About 50,000 Muslim worshipers typically descend on the Old City for prayers every Friday. This week, thousands prayed just outside the security zone. Israeli police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld estimated that not more than 8,000 Muslims prayed in the Old City, with only a few hundred entering the Esplanade of theMosques itself.
Muslim religious leaders allege the detectors are part of an Israeli attempt to expand control over the Muslim- administered site, a claim Israel denies.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas asked the United States to “intervene urgently” and compel Israel to remove the metal detectors, said Nabil Abu Rdeneh, an adviser to the president, the Associated Press reported.
Abbas discussed the growing tensions in Jerusalem in a phone call with President Trump’s top adviser and son- in- law, Jared Kushner, Abu Rdeneh said.
Abbas told Kushner the situation is “extremely dangerous and may go out of control” unless Israel removes the metal detectors, the AP reported.
A compromise was reached late Thursday, when authorities decided to leave the metal detectors in place, but not to force worshipers to walk through them.
Instead, Israeli police officers checked the ID cards of people coming to pray.