Israeli Police Clash With Palestinians at Al-Aqsa Mosque, Prompting Rocket Fire From Gaza

Israel Police forces entered Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem’s Old City early Wednesday morning, firing stun grenades at Palestinian youths who hurled rocks and fireworks at them. The raid came after dozens of the youths, who were wearing masks, barricaded themselves inside the mosque with a stockpile of fireworks, clubs and rocks following evening prayers late on Tuesday, while locking the doors and placing barricades at the entrances. It is believed that the youths were planning to prevent non-Muslim visitors from coming to the site today; there also was concern that they would attempt to attack worshippers at the Western Wall, located under the site. The Israel Police said that officers first spoke to the youths and tried to convince them to come out.  When police entered the mosque the youths threw rocks and set off fireworks at them, desecrating the mosque. Some 350 people were arrested. The official Palestinian news agency Wafa said dozens of worshippers were injured in the police raid. The early morning Fajr prayers were held at the mosque as scheduled. The conflict has raised concerns of a wider conflagration during the Muslim holiday of Ramadan and as Jews begin the Passover festival. Clashes like these two years ago erupted into an 11-day war between Israel and Hamas, as well as violence between Arabs and Jews in Israel. The mosque is on Haram Al-Sharif/the Temple Mount, a hilltop that was the location of the biblical Jewish temples and that is Judaism’s holiest site, as well as the third-holiest site in Islam. It is typically packed with worshippers during Ramadan, and Jews visit Jerusalem in large numbers during Passover. Members of armed Palestinian groups in Gaza responded to the clashes with rocket fire on southern Israel early Wednesday morning, prompting Israeli airstrikes that hit a Hamas weapons factory and a weapons storage facility. Tensions have been steadily rising since Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s far-right government took office late last year.