The hypocritical Mufti

As we mentioned last month, the Waqf is systematically destroying priceless Jewish artifacts on the Temple Mount, with the permission of the Olmert government. The Israeli Antiquities Authority does have some archaeologists on site to watch the destruction being done with heavy machinery and to possibly retrieve bits and pieces of what doesn't get crushed by the Muslims.

A couple of days ago, in an earthshaking find, some artifacts from the First Temple period were discovered:

The artifacts, which date to the First Jewish Temple period—the eighth to sixth centuries B.C.—were found by employees of the Waqf Muslim religious trust doing maintenance work, the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) reported.

The artifacts may be the first physical evidence of human activity at the Temple Mount—also known as Solomon's Temple—in that time.


Jerusalem's district archaeologist Yuval Baruch is supervising the Muslim maintenance project.

Baruch and Sy Gitin, director of the W. F. Albright Institute of Archaeological Research in Jerusalem, Ronny Reich of Haifa University, and Israel Finkelstein of Tel Aviv University, concluded that the finds might help reconstruct the dimensions and boundaries of the Temple Mount during the First Temple Period.

The findings include animal bones; ceramic bowl rims, bases, and body sherds; the base of a juglet used to pour oil; the handle of a small juglet; and the rim of a storage jar, according to the IAA.

The bowl sherds were decorated with wheel burnishing lines characteristic of the First Temple Period.

In addition, a piece of a whitewashed, handmade object was found. It may have been used to decorate a larger object or may have been the leg of an animal figurine.

"This is the first time we have shards from the Temple Mount with a [uniform] date," Haifa University's Reich told National Geographic News.

The find "most certainly" indicates the presence of people in the temple during the late eighth century and seventh century B.C., he said.

"From an archaeological standpoint, this is the first time this has happened," Reich said.

"You can say that this was written in the Bible—but the Bible is a text and texts can be played around with. This is physical evidence."

As one would expect, the Muslims who completely deny that Jews ever lived in ancient Jerusalem - the same ones who deliberately destroy all evidence of Judaism on the Temple Mount - are strongly denying that these finds mean anything. Here's an autotranslation of an Arabic article from Al-Hayat al-Jadida:

Astonished Sheikh Mohammad Hussein General Mufti of Jerusalem and the Palestinian imam and the Al-Aqsa mosque, yesterday, allegations of Israeli occupation authorities and the so-called alleged Temple Mount during excavations carried out by the Waqf Islamic before the close of the extension the electricity cables in the Al-Aqsa mosque.

The Mufti statements issued several months ago on the effects of Israel and which claimed to have found remnants of dust effects in which the Waqf Islamic factions in 1999 outside the Al-Aqsa mosque.

He said: that these allegations are lies and fabrications denying the existence of any implications for the structure of the alleged yards in the Al-Aqsa mosque or the mosque or close to, adding that this earth that the Waqf Islamic factions are superficial and external back to the Ottoman era and not from the Old Testament as they claim.

The Sheikh Hussein that the city of Jerusalem had been many times for demolition and landfill because of earthquakes in Palestine throughout history, so the soil is excavated in recent times have been of the effects they are talking about nothing.

He added that the occupation authorities claimed each time she found the alleged effects of the structure and mean it behind interference in the affairs of Al-Aqsa mosque and the withdrawal of Endowments and the transfer of powers to the conflict and is impeding the restoration.

The discourse and spending excavations carried out by the occupation authorities since 1967 on the Al-Aqsa mosque and the bottom of walls, occupation authorities warned of the consequences of interference in its affairs.

He appealed to all international bodies and organizations to intervene to stop these practices against the Palestinian holy sites, especially the Al-Aqsa Mosque, also called the Arab League and the Organization of Islamic Conference to move soon to stop the campaign Althudi of Jerusalem and Al-Aqsa mosque.

If chutzpah wasn't a Yiddish word, it would have to be invented in Arabic. In the same breath where he claims that there are no problems with excavating directly on the Temple Mount, he calls on the world to condemn Israeli excavations far away from the Al Aqsa Mosque - excavations that are being done with utmost care.

The Mufti's casual dismissal of any finds as being from the Ottoman period - and any sixth-rate archaeologist can easily tell the difference between pottery from the 7th century BCE and pottery from 2400 years later - shows how he is, in the most simple terms, a liar. But his embrace of the destruction of Jewish artifacts while calling on Israel to stop their own work is breathtakingly hypocritical.

Of course, when his purpose is to establish Islamic supremacy and deny any Jewish history in Jerusalem, then his statements are quite consistent, if still as dishonest as can be. Making up fairy tales about Mohammed's flying horse being tied for a couple of hours to the Kotel, which is a story made up entirely by the Grand Mufti in the 1920s in order to get the Jews away from the Western Wall, proves to anyone with an ounce of intellectual honesty that the Muslim claim to Jerusalem is exaggerated specifically in order to de-legitimize Judaism itself.

It is a scandal that the West places equal weight on the liars.