JERUSALEM (AP) — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says he has assured Jordan’s King Abdullah that there will be no change in the status of Jerusalem’s most sensitive holy site amid spiking tensions in the area.
His outreach came a day after Jordan recalled its ambassador to protest an Israeli police assault on the hilltop compound in Jerusalem’s Old City. Tensions were further heightened after a Palestinian slammed his van into a crowd waiting at a train stop, killing an Israeli policeman.
The holy site in Jerusalem’s Old City is known to Jews as the Temple Mount and is the most sacred spot in Judaism. Muslims revere it as the Noble Sanctuary, Islam’s third-holiest site and home to the Al-Aqsa Mosque and the gold-topped Dome of the Rock.
Since Israel captured east Jerusalem and the Old City in 1967, Jewish worshippers have been allowed to visit — but not pray — at the site, which is run by Muslim authorities under the custody of Jordan. In recent weeks hard-line Israeli politicians have stepped up demands that Jews be allowed to pray at the site.
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