Jews have no right to Western Wall, PA 'study' says
By KHALED ABU TOAMEH
22/11/2010
Official paper by published by PA Ministry of Information claims Al-Buraq Wall, as it is known to Muslims, constitutes Waqf property owned by an Algerian-Moroccan Muslim family.
The Western Wall belongs to Muslims and is an integral part of the Al-Aqsa Mosque and the Haram al-Sharif [the Noble Sanctuary], according to an official paper published on Monday by the Palestinian Authority Ministry of Information in Ramallah.
The paper, which has been presented as a “study,” was prepared by Al-Mutawakel Taha, a senior official with the PA Ministry of Information to “refute” Jews’ claim to the Western Wall.
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In the past, PA leaders and officials had also denied Jews’ right to the Kotel, insisting that the Temple Mount had never stood in the area.
The new paper claims that the Western Wall, or Al-Buraq Wall as it is known to Muslims, constitutes Waqf property owned by an Algerian-Moroccan Muslim family.
It claims that there isn’t one stone in the wall that belongs to the era of King Solomon.
The “study” also found that the path next to the Wailing Wall was never a public road, but was established only for the use of Muslims living in the area or making their way toward the mosques on the Temple Mount.
“The Zionist occupation falsely and unjustly claims that it owns this wall which it calls the Western Wall or Kotel,” Taha, who is also a renowned Palestinian poet and writer, wrote in his project. “The Al-Buraq Wall is in fact the western wall of the Al-Aqsa Mosque.”
He added that the Jews had never used the site for worship until the Balfour Declaration of 1917. “This wall was never part of the so-called Temple Mount, but Muslim tolerance allowed the Jews to stand in front of it and weep over its destruction,” he wrote.
“During the British mandate in Palestine, the number of Jews who visited the wall increased to a point where the Muslims felt threatened and then there was the Al-Buraq Revolution on August 23, 1929, where dozens of Muslims were martyred and a large number of Jews were killed.”
The author, who is affiliated with PA President Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah faction, emphasizes that over the past few decades Jews had failed to prove that the wall had any connection to their religion.
“Many studies published by Jewish experts have affirmed that there is no archeological evidence that the Temple Mount was built during the period of King Solomon,” the paper added. “One can only conclude that the Al-Buraq Wall is a Muslim wall and an integral part of the Aqsa Mosque and Haram Al-Sharif. No one has the right to claim ownership over it or change its features or original character. Also, no one has the right to agree with the occupation state’s racist and oppressive measures against history and holy sites.”
The PA ministry’s study also warned that “no Muslim or Arab or Palestinian had the right to give up one stone of the Al-Buraq Wall or other religious sites.”
Please let this be the end of the so called "peace" process.
They say they will never give up on the Temple Mount and even the Kotel and we better not give up either. So let's end the game that goes against Israeli interest.
Israel needs to make one last offer for peace to the Arabs, peace for peace. We should offer to treat the Palestinians better than any Arab country would. This offer should have a time limit.
If the time expires then Israel should go to war and bring the PA leaders to their knees. Abbas should be tried and executed for the part he played in the murder of Israeli athletes in Munich. The Arabs that refuse to live inside Israel and by this I include Judea and Samaria should be sent to Jordan.
