AL-KHALIL (Palestine Foundation Information Center) The member of the Hamas Political Bureau and the head of Hamas Jerusalem office, Harun Nasir Ad-Din, has called on the Palestinian people in the West Bank and Al-Khalil to protect the Ibrahimi Mosque by visiting it in large numbers and staying in it to defend the Muslims’ holy site in the face of Israeli conspiracies and Judaization plans that threaten its sanctity.
Nasser Ad-Din slammed, in a statement on Friday, the Israeli occupation for its refusal to open the Ibrahimi Mosque and hand it over to the Islamic Endowment Administration during Ramadan, especially on Fridays, saying it is part of the Israeli plans to take full control over it.
He stressed that the Israeli continuous and escalating measures are a blatant attack on the Ibrahimi Mosque and constitute a flagrant and dangerous violation of Islamic sanctities.
The Ministry of Endowment and Religious Affairs announced that Israeli occupation authorities refused to hand over the authority over the Ibrahimi Mosque in the Old City of Al-Khalil, including its full halls, squares, and facilities, to the Endowment Administration, as it has always been done on Fridays of the holy month of Ramadan every year.
The ministry said, in a statement on Friday, “this is a dangerous and unprecedented step, in terms of its timing as it comes in the blessed month of Ramadan as part of Israeli systematic plan to obstruct the opening of the entire mosque for Muslims.
It pointed out that since the beginning of the blessed month of Ramadan, Israeli occupation forces have prevented Palestinians under the age of twenty-five from entering the Ibrahimi Mosque.
The Ministry of Endowment reiterated its rejection of the Israeli procedures aiming at obstructing the complete opening of the mosque on Fridays, and its refusal to hand over the authority over it during these days, demanding that UNESCO, which listed the Ibrahimi Mosque among its international heritage sites, should work to stop the Israeli occupation’s attacks and violations of the holy place.
