Shrine boycott remains despite some concessions
— Muslim leaders urged the faithful on Tuesday to keep up their prayer protests and avoid entering a contested Jerusalem shrine, even after Israel dismantled metal detectors that initially triggered the tensions.
Israel said it would replace the metal detectors with new security arrangements based on “advanced technology,” reportedly including sophisticated cameras, but said it could take up to six months to install them.
Muslim clerics have demanded that Israel restore the situation at the shrine — the third holiest in Islam and the holiest in Judaism — to what it was before it installed the metal detectors last week.
The clerics said Tuesday that they need time to study the proposed new Israeli measures. “We need to know all the details before we decide to pray inside the compound,” said the mufti, or top Muslim cleric in Jerusalem, Mohammed Hussein.
Muslim worshipers heeded the call of the clergy, with dozens performing noon prayers in the streets outside the shrine on Tuesday.
The continued protests meant that the escalating crisis between Israel and the Muslim world, which began in mid-July, has not been defused, even after Israel backed down on the metal detectors.
Jordan, the Muslim custodian of the shrine, has played a key role in trying to end the showJERUSALEM down over the holy site.
Over the weekend, Jordan’s efforts were complicated by a shooting at Israel’s Embassy in Amman in which an Israeli guard killed two Jordanians after being attacked by one with a screwdriver.
A 24-hour standoff was resolved after a phone call between Jordan’s King Abdullah II and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.