HEBRON, November 22, 2024 (WAFA) – Israeli Jewish supremacist Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir Friday evening led an encroachment upon the Ibrahimi Mosque in the occupied West Bank city of Hebron.
Thousands of Israeli colonists, led by National Security Minister Ben-Gvir, barged their way into the Ibrahimi Mosque under the pretext of Jewish holidays at a time when the holy site was closed to Palestinian worshippers.
Meanwhile, the occupation forces sealed off the Old City of Hebron, intensified deployments and imposed curfew on several neighborhoods in anticipation of a raid by Israeli colonists, who descended in thousands on streets and the vicinity of the mosque, passing through the Jaber, Wadi al-Hassin and as-Salaymeh neighborhoods.
Director of the mosque, Mutaz Abu Sneineh, said that the occupation forces ordered the Waqf-appointed employees out of the site, announced the site closed until the evening of tomorrow, Saturday, and beefed up their presence at checkpoints and gates leading to the site in preparation for the colonists’ raid.
The city of Hebron, which houses the Ibrahimi Mosque, is home to roughly 160,000 Palestinian Muslims and about 800 notoriously aggressive Israeli settlers who live in compounds heavily guarded by about 1,500 Israeli troops.
Israel has expelled the only international monitors protecting Hebron’s Palestinians from 800 heavily guarded settlers, one of whom committed the 1994 massacre that triggered their deployment.
Thirty years ago, Israeli settler Baruch Goldstein broke into the Ibrahimi Mosque and opened fire at Palestinian Muslim worshippers, killing 29. Four Palestinians were killed on the same day in the clashes that broke out around the Mosque in response to the massacre.
In the aftermath, the mosque was divided in two, with the larger part turned into a synagogue while heavy scrutiny was imposed on the Palestinians and areas closed completely to them, including an important market and the main street, Shuhada street.
The occupation authorities completely seal off the mosque 10 days annually under the pretext of Jewish holidays.
K.F.
