In the early hours of the morning on Wednesday 5th April, video footage emerged from the Al-Aqsa compound, showed IDF soldiers preventing Muslim worshippers from completing their night ‘Tarawe prayers’ during the holiest month of the Islamic calendar.
Teargas and stun grenades were seen fired into the beautiful and stern historical building- which is the 3rd most important mosque to Muslims.
The reality, said Abdullah Jaber, a teenager from Jerusalem who was assaulted in the prayer hall and detained by Israeli forces on Tuesday night, was much, much worse than what was shown on video.
“They kept us on the ground, handcuffed, for a long time, and anyone who raised his head was hit with a gun,” Jaber told Middle East Eye.
My leg hurt, so I told a soldier about it, but he hit me on my chest and cursed me.”
Once the worshippers were forcibly removed from the prayer hall, they were continually being beaten with batons by the heavily armed IDF soldiers. Soldiers can be seen throwing Palestinians to the ground, stamping on them, and binding their hands forcefully behind their backs.
At least 14 Palestinians were seriously injured and around 400 Palestinian worshippers were subsequently detained. As a condition of their release, many of the detainees were forced to sign papers which would ban them from the 3rd most holy site for muslims for a week.
The Arab League is set to hold an emergency meeting to discuss the Israeli police raid on the holy mosque in Jerusalem, following the harrowing attack on innocent Muslim worshippers, as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he was working to “maintain the status quo” at the holy site.
