Palestinian shopkeepers closed up early and police lined the narrow alleys of Jerusalem's Old City Monday, as Arab residents braced for an annual march that often becomes a rowdy and sometimes violent procession of ultranationalist Jews.
The march commemorating Jerusalem Day — which marks Israel’s capture of east Jerusalem, including the Old City and its holy sites sacred to Jews, Christians and Muslims, in the 1967 Mideast war — was set for later in the day. The event is threatening to inflame tensions that are already rife in the restive city amid nearly 600 days of war in Gaza.
Jerusalem lies at the heart of the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians, who each see the city as a key part of their national and religious identity. It is one of the most intractable issues of the conflict and often emerges as a flashpoint.
Last year’s procession, which came during the first year of the war in Gaza, saw young ultranationalist Israelis attack a Palestinian journalist in the Old City and call for violence against Palestinians. Four years ago, the march helped set off an 11-day war in Gaza.
Tour buses carrying young ultranationalist Jews lined up near entrances to the Old City, bringing hundreds from outside Jerusalem, including settlements in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. Dozens of people inside the Old City could be heard chanting “Death to Arabs.”
Police said they would maintain order and urged the public to refrain from taunting and violence.
Increased Jewish visits to a flashpoint holy site
Israel's far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, who oversees the country’s police force, visited a flashpoint hilltop compound holy to Jews and Muslims, where the Al Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock are located today.
Perceived encroachments by Jews on the site have set off widespread violence on a number of occasions going back decades.
“We are marking a holiday for Jerusalem,” Ben-Gvir said Monday at the site, accompanied by other lawmakers and a rabbi. “There are truly many Jews flooding the Temple Mount. How nice to see that.”
Beyadenu, an activist group that encourages Jewish visits to the site, said dozens of people had ascended to the holy compound Monday draped in the Israeli flag, and had prayed there.
Since Israel captured the site in 1967, a tenuous understanding between Israeli and Muslim religious authorities at the compound has allowed Jews — who revere the site as the Temple Mount, the location of the biblical temples — to visit but not pray there.
Ben-Gvir says he is changing that status quo. Palestinians already say it has long been eroding because of an increase in Jewish visits to the site.
“Today, thank God, it is possible to pray on the Temple Mount,” Ben-Gvir said at the site, according to a statement from his office.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said in the past there has been no change to the status quo. Police said that Monday's march would not enter the site.
Israel considers all of Jerusalem to be its eternal, undivided capital. Its annexation of east Jerusalem is not internationally recognized. Palestinians want an independent state with east Jerusalem as its capital.
For many in Israel, Jerusalem Day is a joyous occasion that marks a moment of redemption in their country's history, when access to the key Jewish holy site of the Western Wall was restored and the city was unified. But over recent years, the Jerusalem Day march in the city has become dominated by young nationalist and religious Israelis and on some occasions has descended into violence.
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