Palestinian ‘lone-wolf’ attacks spur holy-site ban

JERUSALEM: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has banned Israeli cabinet ministers and legislators from visiting a sensitive Jerusalem holy site where rising tension has spilt over into a wave of Palestinian attacks.

In the latest incident, a Palestinian stabbed and wounded a Jewish seminary student on a main road in Jerusalem yesterday and the assailant was arrested at the scene, police said.

Four Israelis have been killed in stabbings in Jerusalem and a driveby shooting in the occupied West Bank in the past week, and two Palestinians have been shot dead and dozens injured in clashes with security services, triggering fears of escalation.

After a right-wing outcry, Netanyahu’s office clarified that the ban on politicians’ visits to the al-Aqsa mosque compound in Jerusalem’s walled Old City would also include Arab parliamentarians. It said in a statement that the move was aimed at “cooling things down around the Temple Mount”.

Palestinians fear that visits by Jewish groups, including ultranationalist lawmakers, to the plaza revered in Judaism as the site of two destroyed biblical temples are eroding Muslim religious control of al-Aqsa, Islam’s third holiest shrine.

As prime minister, Netanyahu has the authority to order police to halt the visits on security grounds, and his office said the ban was open-ended. In recent weeks, clashes have erupted at the holy site between Palestinian rockthrowers and Israeli police.

Israeli government officials have accused Palestinian leaders of playing on Muslim concerns over al-Aqsa to incite Palestinians to violence – so far mostly “lone-wolf” attacks.

But Israeli military officials have noted that security co-operation with the Palestinian Authority, which exercises limited self-rule in the occupied West Bank, is continuing. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has said publicly he wants to avoid armed confrontation with Israel.

The US has urged both sides to pull away from violence. – Reuters