Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News: Cave of the Patriarchs

Showing posts with label Cave of the Patriarchs. Show all posts

Wednesday, August 18, 2021

Muslims upgrade Hebron site to "fourth holiest mosque in Islam" to keep Jews away

The director of the mosque at the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron, Sheikh Hefzy Abu Sneina, now claims that his mosque is the fourth holiest mosque in Islam after the Al-Haram in Mecca, the Al-Nabawi mosque in Medina and the Al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem. He says that it contains Islamic sanctities and the tombs of their prophets, "which proves the right of Palestinians and Muslims to it and denies any Israeli claims of their rights in it. "

Even though the prophets buried there have nothing to do with Islam, with the exception of Abraham, but everything to do with Judaism.

The Jewish ties to Hebron have given the Ibrahimi Mosque some holiness inflation, it seems.

I have not seen the Hebron mosque listed as the fourth holiest in any other source.

This article in The Guardian says that #4 is Imam Ali in Iraq, #5 is the Dome of the Rock, #6 is Great Mosque of Djenne in Mali and #7 is the Quba Mosque in Medina. Hebron isn't mentioned.

This site lists the Quba mosque as #4.

Wikipedia gives three sources saying that the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus is the fourth holiest site in Islam.

So how did the mosque in Hebron rocket to the top of the charts? (No one will argue about 1,2 or 3, although Shiite Muslims used to rate Al Aqsa as #5, behind Najaf and Karbala.)

It seems that the holier Jews consider a site, the more Muslims want to take it away from Jews. It happens in Jerusalem, in Hebron, in Bethlehem, in Shechem (Nablus.)

It is pure antisemitism, and something that no one is willing to talk about.

An elevator for the disabled is called a "racist, Judaizing, colonialist,Talmudic crime" by the Palestinian Authority

The Palestinian ministry of foreign affairs issued a statement condemning Israel for doing...something..at the Cave of the Patriarchs, what they call the Ibrahimi Mosque.

Nowhere in the entire press release does the ministry actually say what Israel is planning to do.

The mentality of the racist colonialism dominates the government in the occupying state and its various arms, and is embodied in its worst forms, with the operations of control, familyization and Judaization of the Ibrahimi Mosque, changing its historical, cultural, cultural and religious landmarks, and depriving the original owners of the land and Muslims from accessing it and praying in it. The occupation is one, its mentality is one, and its narrative is one, whether as it constantly appears in the oppression of Palestinian and Arab prisoners in prisons, or in the theft of Palestinian land and targeting the Palestinian presence through mass demolitions and forced displacement, or in the attempt to impose Israeli sovereignty and control over all the holy, archaeological and historical sites that are located in the heart of cities and Palestinian towns. As a result of this racist mentality, Palestinians are constantly paying high prices for the occupation’s complex crimes and violations. ....It is the mentality of Judaization and creeping annexation that denies the right of the Palestinian to his homeland and tries to change the parameters of the historical and legal reality to serve the Talmudic narrative of occupation, with the aim of replacing the political character of the conflict with the religious one.

The Ministry condemns in the strongest terms Israel's colonial attacks on the Ibrahimi Mosque and Christian and Islamic holy sites, and bears the Israeli government full and direct responsibility for this crime. The Ministry calls on UNESCO to defend its decisions and take the necessary practical measures to protect the Ibrahimi Mosque and return it to its historical and legal reality that was distorted and stolen by the occupation forces....

When the ministry says they want the Cave of the Patriarchs to "return to its historical and legal reality," they mean they want to revert to the days before 1967 when Jews were not allowed to visit the site altogether.

So why did they issue this unhinged screed?

This is all about an elevator that Israel approved to be built to that handicapped people can access the holy site. Right now, anyone in a wheelchair needs to be physically carried up the ancient stone stairs to visit the site.

Israel unilaterally decided to build the elevator after many years of lobbying because the Palestinian Authority would never agree to anything like this. The human rights of the disabled would not even be considered as a factor. In fact, you will not find any supposedly liberal anti-Israel activist who supports the idea that Jews have the human right to visit the site freely, let alone that disabled people have the right to visit safely, because the imperative of being anti-Israel is much more important than mere human rights.

Arab media claim that this will be a Jewish-only elevator. Arab media is lying - the elevator is for all. But the hate that the Palestinians and their supporters have for Jews is far, far higher than their desire to allow even disabled Muslims to visit their own holy sites, as long as the plan also helps any Jews.

The main Palestinian argument is that this elevator and supporting infrastructure is using land that belongs to Arab Hebron and the Waqf, and therefore this violates agreements. But the Palestinians have also signed agreements saying that Jews should have free access to their holy places. No one seems to insist that they hold up those agreements. If they were a normal government that cared about human rights and peace, something could have been hammered out to allow wheelchair access for all back in 2003.

When the PA uses language like "racist" and "colonialist" and "Talmudic" - one of their favorite epithets - to describe an elevator to help the disabled, it proves yet again that this is all about hating Jews and denying Jews their rights.

Judaism's two holiest places are filled with Muslims today

Over 100,000 Muslims filled the Temple Mount today, Judaism's holiest place, for Eid al Adha prayers today.

Thousands more filled the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron, Judaism's second holiest spot.

Imagine if the situation was reversed and there was Muslim control over these places. Would they allow Jews to enter on their holy days?

We don't have to imagine. When Muslims controlled them before 1967, Jews were banned from entering both. Muslims would not allow Jews to go beyond the seventh step at the Cave of the Patriarchs, and they would gather to pray at that step.

Even today, even though Jewish holy spots are listed in the Oslo agreements as places that Jews should be able to freely and safely visit, the Jewish sites under Palestinian Authority rule can only be visited sporadically and when protected by the Israeli army.

And Muslims insist, today, that these holy spots are exclusively Muslim and Jews should be banned altogether from them.

The international community, which wants to give control of these places back to Muslims, will never insist on Jewish rights to visit and worship at Jewish holy places. It is up to Israel to enforce that.

Only under Jewish rule is there respect for all religions in the Land of Israel.

Israel set to build elevator for all to access to Tomb of the Patriarchs, Palestinians claim it is only for Jews

The planned additions

Palestinian site Safa reports that Israel's attorney general Avichai Mendelblit recently approved a plan use land next to the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron to build an elevator and ramps to help access "for the Jewish disabled" to the holy place.

Even though they are quoting Arutz-7, the original report makes clear that the elevator is meant for all, Arabs and Jews as well as tourists.

Israel has tried for years to cooperate with the PA in helping give access to all to the site, and the PA refused to talk with Israeli authorities, as this 2019 report notes. Even the most right-wing Jews of Hebron insist that the elevator be open to Muslims, saying "The Cave of the Patriarchs and Matriarchs belongs to the people of Israel, and the state must ensure that every person of every religion can pray there."

Even the far left Meretz agrees that there should be universal access:

A wide variety of elected officials this year have joined the call to create access for the disabled. Mossi Raz, a former Member of Knesset from the left-wing Meretz party called for wheelchair access. Despite being an and an ardent opponent of the Jewish community, Channel 20 reported he sent a personal letter to the Palestinian Authority Minister of Religious Affairs and to the PA mayor of Hebron asking them to approve the permit.

Right now people in wheelchairs need to be physically carried up some 60 stairs.

The Palestinians are saying that the land surrounding the site belongs to the Waqf.

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Palestinians hold a conference where they claim to be Canaanites (update)

On Saturday a "Palestinian Canaanite Conference" was held in the Mahmoud Darwish Museum in Ramallah.

At the conference, Palestinian prime minister Mohamed Shtayyeh claimed that the Palestinians are descendants of the Canaanites.

There is no historic evidence of this claim. But Shtayyeh seems to know this, because at the same time he said that this is a war of "narratives."

"We launched this conference because Israel is waging a systematic war against us. Of all those wars - geography, demography, water and money - the most dangerous is the war of the narratives."

Shtayyeh continued, "All the excavations under the Aqsa Mosque, the settlers' attacks on the Ibrahimi Mosque [Cave of the Patriarchs], Joseph's Tomb, and the enactment of the Law of Nationalism all relate to the war of the narratives."

In other words, the entire purpose of the conference was to push the fiction that Palestinians are Canaanites, because even the Torah admits that the land was Canaanite before the Israelites conquered it. Identifying as Canaanite allows Palestinians to claim that not only were they there before the Jews, but that the Jews had expelled them thousands of years ago.

Even more absurdly, Shtayyeh claimed that the modern Palestinians still worshiped Baal as their alleged ancestors did: "Baal was the most important god among the Canaanites, and we to this day call on his name when we pray for water for the land which is watered from rain water."

Worshipers of Baal were known for other things he might not wish to be associated with.

Engraving of Baal Pe'or, defecating

UPDATE: Shtayyeh ("Winter") is a relatively rare name for Palestinians. I see a Shtayeh family centered in northern Egypt and a Syrian Bedouin tribe with that name in the 19th century.

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Muslim "Protest praying" in Hebron

Last weekend was he one Sabbath of the year where Jews celebrate regaining control over the second most sacred spot in Judaism, the Cave of the Patriarchs. It is one of the ten days of the year that Jews have access to the entire building. Some 45,000 Jews came to celebrate, most staying (and eating) in tents because there are not nearly enough rooms to accommodate them all.

Some youngsters apparently got out of hand but from what I can tell the vast majority was well behaved and had a great time.

But this upset the Muslims so they decided to make their own "protest prayer" event in Hebron on Friday.

Muslims love to say that Israel is trying to turn this into a religious conflict - but what is a "protest praying" if not a desire to turn it into a religious conflict? Using prayer as a protest tool pretty much ignores the entire purpose of prayer.

If religious Jews held a "protest prayer" there would be angry op-eds that they don't know what prayer is. (When left-wing Jews try to hijack religious rituals for their own politics, no one seems to mind.) But a Muslim "protest prayer" shows again what a huge double standard there is between Muslims and Jews.

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Did UNESCO say that the Tomb of the Patriarchs was purely Muslim?

In response to the news that Benjamin Netanayahu will visit the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron today, Palestinian Chief Justice Mahmoud al-Habbash stated that "the infringement of the Palestinian territories and Islamic holy sites for electoral contests is a crime and a violation of the Palestinian rights in the land and holy sites, and a flagrant violation of international laws and resolutions of international legitimacy, especially resolutions of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization "UNESCO", which confirmed more than once that the city of Hebron and the Ibrahimi Mosque It is a pure Islamic heritage and there is no right for non-Muslims in it like the Temple Mount and the Old City of Jerusalem."

Is that what UNESCO said?

In 2017, UNESCO declared the old city of Hebron to be a "Palestinian heritage site." But its description of the Cave of the Patriarchs does not say that it was an Islamic holy site alone:

The main monument of the town is the centrally sited Al Haram Al-Ibrahimi Mosque/The Tomb of the Patriarchs. Elements of the current building date back to long before the Mamluk Period, as do its religious associations and the reasons why it is revered by Christians, Jews and Muslims alike. The mosque is said to host the remains of God’s prophet Abraham/ Ibrahim, his wife Sara, their sons Isaac and Jacob and their wives Rebecca and Leah, as well as Jacob’s son Joseph. (?)
There is reference in the Book of Genesis to Abraham purchasing the field for the tomb. The sanctity of the tomb site was known from as early as the Herodian Period, (1st century BCE) when a monumental enclosure was built around the sacred Cave of Machpelah, whose location is now lost. This enclosure of massive, finely dressed stone blocks still frames the mosque and within it are structures that reflect later Fatimid, Crusader, Ayyubid, Mamluk and Ottoman periods. The great covered prayer hall was constructed in 12th century out of the remains of the Crusaders 11th century Romanesque church which in turn arose from the ruins of a 7th century mosque.

Habbash is lying - UNESCO never declared Hebron or the Tomb of the Patriarchs to be "Islamic," let alone exclusively Islamic. It recognizes that that main frame of the site was built in Herodian times, under Jewish self-rule. It also recognizes that it was a holy Jewish (and Christian) site way before Islam.

UNESCO simply declared it Palestinian based on the world believing that it is part of a mythical nation that never existed. But it never said a word about it being exclusively Muslim.

Given that under international law, people have the right to visit their holy sites, Palestinians are lying when they try to ban Jews from worship in sites that were holy 2000 years before Mohammed ever soiled his first diaper.

I also will note that already in 2009, when "Palestine" first bid to join UNESCO, they made it clear that the primary purpose of them joining that organization was to ban Jews from holy sites.

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Jews dedicating a Torah to the Cave of the Patriarchs to help families of kids with cancer. Arabs want UNESCO to stop it.

Tonight at 8 PM Israel time, there will be a ceremony dedicating a Sefer Torah (Torah scroll) to be used at the Ma'arat HaMachpela, the Cave of the Patriarchs where tradition says Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and their wives are buried.

It is the second holiest site in Judaism after the Temple Mount.

The ceremony will include a concert. The money raised for the event is being used to provide vacations to families of children with cancer in Israel.

In response, Palestinian Arabs are now claiming that the site is the fourth holiest in Islam, and saying that the idea of Jews dedicating a Torah to a synagogue is a desecration of the site.

They are threatening violence.

The Hebron Waqf said in a press release: "Some Hebrew sites published a promotional video stating that the settlers will present at 8 pm on Thursday a Torah scroll to the Haram al-Ibrahimi Mosque with a concert.

"This attack is a grave violation of the sanctity of the Haram al-Ibrahimi Mosque and a dangerous precedent, and it affects the feelings of Muslims," the statement said.

The Waqf said that "the occupation government has full responsibility for the visits of the settlers and their desecration of the Haram al-Ibrahimi Mosque, the change in its Arab Islamic features, and the imposition of punitive measures against it."

The organization called on all international and human rights institutions, especially UNESCO, to shoulder their responsibilities towards the holy place, and to stop this "grave violation."

In a veiled threat, the Waqf said "the occupation government bears full responsibility for what happens as a result." Meaning that Muslims will riot.

The Palestinian Authority issued a very similar statement denouncing the event.

Ma'an published this video of a large tourist group visiting the holy site, whom they call "settlers," in order to inflame Arabs to stop large numbers of respectful Jews and non-Jews from visiting the holy site.

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Abbas says allowing Jews to visit the Temple Mount is a "red line"

The official Palestinian Wafa news agency reports:

The head of the State of Palestine Mahmoud Abbas spoke about the need to stop violations against Al Aqsa Mosque, stressing that it is a red line that can not be tolerated in the face of the suffering of daily attacks and violations by the occupation forces and settlers.

The PA Ministry of Information says that any Jews that visit the holiest spot in Judaism are doubling their "terrorism" by visiting during Ramadan, that Israel is "waging war on holy sites" and is disregarding the feelings of Muslims by entering the site. The ministry requested that UNESCO put pressure on Israel to stop its "religious terrorism" and "prevent the establishment of Talmudic rituals in the Haram al Sharif."

Nothing is being said against Christians peacefully visiting the site. Only Jews must be banned, and now Abbas is saying that such a ban on Jews is a red line before any peace agreement is made.

Abbas is demanding that the world support his antisemitism as a prerequisite for "peace."

This joins his demand that Israel release all Arab terrorists from prison before any "peace" agreement could be signed.

Which means that Abbas is telling the world that the state that he is demanding will enforce terror-supporting and antisemitic policies.

And still not one Western nation or major Western media outlet is willing to publicly call their "moderate peacemaker" out for what he explicitly says.

The Ministry of Information also complained about the fact that during the Shavuot holiday, Muslims are not allowed to visit the "Ibrahimi Mosque" in Hebron. This is a long standing agreement where the Cave of the Patriarchs is used exclusively by either Jews or Muslims for an equal number of days every year, and the spaces are divided between Jews and Muslims the rest of the year.

When Abbas says he wants a return to the "status quo" on the holy sites, he means the status quo of when Jordan didn't allow a single Jew to visit any of Judaism's holy sites in Jerusalem, Hebron, Bethlehem or elsewhere.

Antisemitism is part and parcel of the Palestinian Authority's official policies.

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Jewish pilgrims shot outside holy site.

Every year there is a pilgrimage of thousands of Jews to Hebron, to mark the Torah portion that describes how Abraham purchased the Tomb of the Patriarchs from Ephron the Hittite.

Many of the pilgrims sleep in tents because there aren't enough houses for them to stay.

This year, despite the danger, thousands more were set to come:

Defying the threat of terror and the stormy weather, thousands of Jews are planning to take part in the annual Shabbat Chayei Sarah festivities in Hebron, a celebration of the purchase of the Cave of the Patriarchs (Me’arat Ha’Machpela) by Abraham which is recounted in the weekly Torah portion named after Abraham’s wife who was buried there 3,691 years ago, according to Jewish tradition.

This Shabbat, November 6-7, the Jewish community of Hebron and neighboring Kiryat Arba will open their homes to guests from throughout Israel and around the world who will come to Hebron to read the Torah portion recalling the passing of the Biblical matriarch Sarah and her husband Abraham’s purchase of the Cave of the Patriarchs as a burial plot. The cave subsequently became the final resting place of Abraham himself, as well as his son Isaac and his wife Rivkah, and their son Jacob and his wife Leah.

“The city of Hebron is proud and eager to host the myriad guests who will be joining us in celebration this Shabbat,” Yishai Fleisher, International Spokesman for the City of Hebron, said in a statement. “Israel has been hit by a plague of jihad, yet it continues to operate everyday with optimism and resilience. We look forward to a fun and festive experience for all the good people, government ministers, rabbis and educators, Jews and non-Jews who will come to pay tribute and join us in solidarity.”

Apparently, the idea of thousands of Jews on a religious pilgrimage was too much for some Arabs. From TOI:

Two Israeli teens were hurt Friday evening in a shooting attack near the Tomb of the Patriarchs in the West Bank city of Hebron.

One of the two, a 16-year-old, was seriously hurt and the other, aged 18, sustained light injuries. The younger teen was hit by gunfire in the upper body. He was taken to Shaare Zedek hospital in Jerusalem, Channel 2 reported.

Maariv said both of the victims were conscious at the scene of the attack.

The gunfire apparently came from the direction of the Abu Sneina neighborhood of the divided city, targeting worshipers as they emerged from the tomb.

Large numbers of IDF troops were deployed to the Palestinian neighborhoods surrounding the Jewish settlement in Hebron to search for the cell behind the attack, the Ynet news website reported.

Imagine the world outcry if teenage Christians were shot by snipers leaving the cathedral in Notre Dame. That's pretty much the equivalent to what happened here. But since the victims are only Jews, and it happened in the territories that the world believes should be Jew-free even though Jews have been there for thousands of years. In other words, the lack of media outrage is because too many believe that the Jews deserve it.

There is a rich irony here. Abraham purchased the burial site, publicly, for an exorbitant price, specifically so that later generations would know that this land undoubtedly belonged to him and his designated descendants. David did the same with the Temple Mount, and Jacob did the same with a section of Shechem (Nablus.) And these areas is the very areas that the world insists that Jews have no right to.

AP reports that the Tomb of the Patriarchs is in the "center" of Hebron. No, it's on the edge, and Kiryat Arba is adjacent to H2. Hebron is a huge Arab city and there are no IDF restrictions for the vast majority of Arabs who live there. Not that you would know that from reading the mainstream media.

A third teen was shot near Hebron.

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