Tens of thousands of Palestinians performed Friday prayers at the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem, for the first time since it was reopened, last Sunday, after it was closed for nearly two months as part of anti-Corona virus measures.
The Islamic Endowments Department in Jerusalem said, in a brief statement, that 50,000 people performed Friday prayers at the Al-Aqsa Mosque.
The Palestinians began flowing to the Al-Aqsa Mosque since dawn, taking prayer rugs and wearing medical masks. Mosque guards placed sterilizers and masks at its entrances, and worshipers kept a distance between them during the prayers.
In Friday sermon, Sheikh Ahmed Salim said, "This is the first Friday you witnessed after a two-month absence from the Al-Aqsa Mosque, and sovereignty over Jerusalem and Al-Aqsa is for the servants of God who are believers, and it is pure to Muslims that no one can crowd with them." He urged the Palestinians to tighten their travel to the Al-Aqsa Mosque.
The Department of Islamic Endowments in Jerusalem had suspended the entry of worshipers to Al-Aqsa at the end of March, as part of the measures to combat the pandemic of Corona, before reopening the mosque on Sunday, as a precautionary and preventive measure.
As of Wednesday, Palestine recorded 179 cases of corona in Occupied Jerusalem, but the Ministry of Health does not include this outcome among all injuries in the Palestinian territories due to Israel's prevention of it from working in the city.