ISRAELI police clashed with Palestinian worshippers inside Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa Mosque compound yesterday.
Palestinian guards of the mosque said dozens of Israeli officers raided the compound, entering through the Moroccan and Chain Gates and firing stun grenades and rubber-coated bullets to disperse Muslim worshippers.
The guards said several youths suffered from excessive tear gas inhalation and were injured by rubber-coated bullets and shrapnel from stun grenades.
Witnesses added that two of the youths were badly injured – one in the head and another in the eye. A doctor and nurse were allowed to enter the compound an hour later.
Israeli forces raided the al-Qabali mosque, where Muslims conduct Friday prayers, and later closed the mosque with chains and steel barriers as right-wing Jews prepared to tour the compound, Azzam al-Khatib, the director of the Jerusalem department of religious endowment, said.
Additionally, restrictions were imposed on Palestinian worshippers entering the compound. Men under 50 years old were banned from entering and women were forced to hand over their identity cards upon entering.
The clashes quickly spread into the alleys of the surrounding Old City.
Near Lions’ Gate, one of the seven entrances to the historic heart of East Jerusalem, Israeli police fired tear gas and stun grenades to disperse a large crowd of Palestinians.
Dozens of children on their way to school were affected by the gas.
One person was killed and at least 13 injured when a car deliberately rammed pedestrians in Jerusalem yesterday, with the driver shot dead shortly afterwards.
Israeli media reported that the suspect exited the vehicle after ramming into pedestrians and began attacking passers-by with an iron rod before being shot in the head and neck by border police.
The man was identified as Ibrahim Muhammad Daoud al-Akkari, 48, from Shufat.
His brother was released and deported to Turkey as part of the Shalit prisoner exchange deal in 2011.
Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri said the attack was a ‘natural response’ to Israeli crimes in Jerusalem and a sign that the city is set to explode.
He called on Palestinians to protect and defend the Al-Aqsa Mosque.
Meanwhile, Israel’s parliament passed a law that could block the release in any future peace negotiations of Palestinian prisoners convicted of politically motivated murders, a spokesman said on Tuesday.
The 120-member Knesset voted late on Monday 35 to 15 in favour of the bill, which was initiated by a far-right politician and approved by the cabinet in June.
The law gives judges the power to convict murder suspects under a new category of ‘extraordinarily severe circumstances’ which would prevent the government from releasing them in any future deals.
