Dr. Omar al-Kiswani, director of Al-Aqsa Mosque, said that the settlers’ incursions “will not change the reality of Al-Aqsa Mosque, and will not be given any legitimacy, as evidenced by the fact that they are only implemented with the protection of the Israeli police and its special forces.”
In an interview with the evening program on Al-Jazeera Mubasher, he praised the pilgrimage to Al-Aqsa Mosque and the intense presence of worshipers and Al-Murabites, stressing that this dispels the plans of the occupation and thwarts its repeated efforts aimed at changing the historical reality.
Al-Kiswani added that settlers stormed Al-Aqsa on Sunday, coinciding with the 74th anniversary of the Nakba.
He continued, "The storming came in two phases, the first from 7 to 11 in the morning, and witnessed the storming of 7 groups of 103 settlers, and the second storming in the afternoon. The intruders performed Talmudic prayers and provocative marches inside Al-Aqsa Mosque with the aim of perpetuating the bitter reality."
Press coverage: "#Watched settlers performing the rituals of "epic prostration" during their storming of Al-Aqsa this afternoon" pic.twitter.com/iYGl9U6JF7
— AlQastal Al Qastal (@AlQastalps) May 15, 2022
Regarding the extensive presence of the Israeli police with the intruders, Al-Kiswani said, “They only storm with the protection of the occupation police and the special forces that secure the incursions and spread in the vicinity of Al-Aqsa Mosque to secure these intruders.”
In response to a question by Al Jazeera Mubasher regarding the settlers' goal of storming, he replied, "The occupation wants to make the scene usual, and to impose the so-called temporal and spatial division of the mosque."
On May 15 of each year, the Palestinians commemorate the 1948 Nakba, when hundreds of thousands of Palestinians were expelled from their homes.
In front of Bab al-Amoud in occupied Jerusalem, on the anniversary of the Nakba.. "From generation to generation about return, there is no alternative" pic.twitter.com/vBSXfJAZ1O
— AlQastal Al Qastal (@AlQastalps) May 15, 2022
The term (the Nakba) is used to describe the process of displacement of Palestinians from their lands by armed gangs, in 1948, in preparation for the declaration of the establishment of Israel in the same year.
The number of the displaced was estimated at 800,000 Palestinians out of 771 Palestinian towns and villages, of which Israel destroyed 531 villages and removed them from existence.
The commemoration of the 74th anniversary of the Nakba comes in light of tensions and escalation with the Israelis, exacerbated by the Israeli police’s attack on participants in the funeral of our colleague Shireen Abu Aqleh, who was assassinated last Wednesday.
This is how it was.. and this is how it became.. and as it was going to return.. ✌🏻 pic.twitter.com/hJMQVSBRjY
— AlQastal Al Qastal (@AlQastalps) May 15, 2022
Thousands of Palestinians gathered, on Sunday, in the center of the city of Ramallah in the West Bank, carrying Palestinian flags, and stood silent for 74 seconds, in reference to the seventy-fourth anniversary of the Nakba.
The participants raised black banners, and another one depicted the "key of return", which symbolizes the keys to the houses that their owners carried when they left in 1948, while sirens sounded throughout the city.
The Palestinian cabinet had called for commemorating the Nakba through the central “return march” in the city of Ramallah, where the Palestinian leadership is based.