Crowds of Israelis on Monday streamed through Jerusalem’s Old City, where some scuffled with residents and hurled insults at Palestinians, as annual celebrations of Israel’s capture of east Jerusalem took place.
Jerusalem Day, as the celebrations are known, commemorates Israeli forces taking east Jerusalem during the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.
Israel considers all of Jerusalem, including the annexed Palestinian-majority east, its indivisible capital, but the international community does not recognize this, and Palestinians want east Jerusalem as the capital of a future state.
Photo: Reuters
Far-right Israeli Minister of National Security Itamar Ben Gvir on Monday visited the al-Aqsa mosque compound, known to Jews as the Temple Mount, to mark the occasion, which was being held for a second year under the shadow of the war in Gaza.
“I ascended to the Temple Mount for Jerusalem Day, and prayed for victory in the war” and the return of hostages held in Gaza, he said.
His past visits to the site have sparked anger among Palestinians and their supporters.
The al-Aqsa mosque is Islam’s third-holiest site and a symbol of Palestinian national identity. The Temple Mount is Judaism’s holiest place, although Jews are forbidden from praying there.
Every year, thousands of Israeli nationalists, many of them religious Jews, march through Jerusalem and its annexed Old City, including in predominantly Palestinian neighborhoods, waving Israeli flags, dancing and sometimes accosting residents.
The route ends at the Western Wall, the last remnant of the Second Temple destroyed by the Romans in 70AD, the holiest site where Jews are allowed to pray.
“After so many years that the people of Israel were not here in Jerusalem and in the land of Israel, we arrived here and conquered Jerusalem, the Temple Mount and the Western Wall,” said 21-year-old Yeshiva student Yosef Azoulai. “So we celebrate this day in which we won over all our enemies.”
Groups of young Israelis were seen confronting Palestinian shopkeepers, passersby and schoolchildren, as well as Israeli rights activists and police, at times spitting on people, lobbing insults and trying to force their way into houses.
Some chanted “death to Arabs,” “may your village burn” and “Gaza belongs to us,” drawing the occasional uncomfortable look from families making their way to the Western Wall.
As evening settled in, large crowds had congregated to celebrate at the holy site.
Authorities sometimes order Palestinian shops in the Old City to shut, although business owners this year said that they had mostly closed down out of fear of harassment.
Outside the Old City, former Knesset member Moshe Feiglin was advertising his far-right political party Identity.
“Every nation and every religion has its capital ... but for some reason, all the nations want a part of our one and only holy city,” he said. “Jerusalem belongs to the Jews and only to the Jews.”
This year’s Jerusalem Day comes amid renewed calls by some Israeli right-wing figures to annex more Palestinian territory as the war in Gaza rages.
The Israeli army on Monday said that three projectiles were launched from Gaza, two falling inside the territory and one intercepted.
Hamas in 2021 launched rockets toward Jerusalem as marchers approached the Old City, sparking a 12-day war in Gaza, and outbreaks of violence in Israel between Israelis and Palestinians.
Israel banned the UN’s agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA, from operating in east Jerusalem earlier this year over accusations that it provided cover for Hamas militants, and on Monday, a group of Israelis forced their way into one of its vacated compounds.
“The group asserted they were ‘liberating’” the facility, UNWRA West Bank director Roland Friedrich said on social media.
Israeli police, who deployed in force, said that over the course of the day “officers have handled numerous cases of suspects involved in public disturbances.”
In the morning, peace activists handed out flowers to challenge what they saw as the main march’s divisive message.
Orly Likhovski of the Israel Religious Action Center said those taking part in the peace event were “not willing to accept that this day is marked by violence and racism,” adding that they hoped to represent “a Jewish voice for a different kind of Jerusalem.”
Some Palestinians accepted the flowers, but one elderly man near Damascus Gate politely refused, saying: “Do you see what is happening in Gaza? I’m sorry, but I cannot accept.”
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