A Palestinian woman was convicted on Sunday of assaulting an Israeli legislator during the Knesset member’s November 2014 visit to the Temple Mount.Here's the video, although it is unclear when exactly Moalem-Refaeili was pushed.
The indictment from the Jerusalem Magistrate’s Court said Sahar Natshe shouted “go away” and “Allahu Akbar” as she pushed Shuli Moalem-Refaeli (Jewish Home), in an attempt to prevent the MK from entering the compound.
This is hardly a big story, but Palestinian media are upset over this ruling.
Not so much because of the conviction, but because the court apparently also noted that Judaism's holiest site is holy to Jews.
The "Quds Foundation for Human Rights" issued a statement condemning the court for daring to claim that the Temple Mount is holy to Jews. It said that the court ruling mentioned not only previous Israeli Supreme Court decisions but also referred to Maimonides (the Rambam.)
"The Court used the Jewish religious vocabulary to bestow the Jewish character on the Al-Aqsa Mosque, and defined the limits of the sanctity of the place and according to the Jewish religion," the statement said.
The group warned of the use of Jewish legal texts to prove that something is holy to Jews is outside the bounds of the court's legal rights. It also claimed that declaring the Mount holy for Jews is a violation of the rights of Palestinians, Arabs and Muslims.
This is of course ridiculous; quoting the Rambam is meant as objective proof of the holiness of the site, it is not being quoted as a legal precedent.
By their logic, there is no such thing as a Jewish holy place, because every single such place is claimed as a Muslim holy place (by sheer coincidence, of course.)
Another Arab newspaper claimed that the court also gave the right for Jews to pray on the Temple Mount unimpeded. I cannot find any corroboration to that.