Erekat’s remarks came after Palestinian Foreign Minister Riyad Al Malki criticised an agreement Amman reached with the Israelis to install video cameras at Al Haram Al Sharif in Jerusalem to ease the tension there and ensure that the status quo remains intact.
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Richard Lakin, an Israeli-American teacher was wounded in a Palestinian stabbing and shooting attack, while on a bus in Jerusalem.
United Nations human rights chief Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein also voiced alarm, warning that the deadly violence rocking Israel and the Palestinian territories was “dangerous in the extreme” and could lead to a “catastrophe”.
Hanan Ashrawi, a member of the executive committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization, said the step, if adopted, would deprive Palestinians in Jerusalem of the most basic rights and services and provoke confrontations.
Hammam Said was the third Palestinian to be shot and killed on Tuesday night, after two other Palestinian men were shot and killed by the Gush Etzion junction south of Bethlehem.
He spoke amid new violence between Palestinians and Israelis.
Basel Ghattas, a Christian member of the Israeli parliament for the Arab Joint List coalition, said he visited the holy site on Wednesday morning “to show Netanyahu we don’t recognise his authority over the mosque”.
Salah’s branch of the Islamic Movement has been accused of financing two Muslim groups, the female Murabitat and male Murabitun who act as self-appointed sentinels at Al-Aqsa, keeping an eye on Jewish visitors and harassing those they suspect of secretly praying.
“Muslims and Arabs can visit the mosque in a very quiet and normal way without violence, but the Israelis are inciting and provoking”, he said. In five weeks of violence, 11 Israelis have been killed in attacks by Palestinians, mostly in stabbings, and 55 Palestinians – including 35 labeled by Israel as attackers – have been killed by Israeli fire.
Israeli safety forces shot dead one of many assailants and captured the opposite, police stated.
He also called on the Islamic and Arab world to take part in protecting the Al-Aqsa Mosque from Israeli violations.
But Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas said “it is no longer useful to waste time in negotiations” and warned a continuation of the violence could “kill the last shred of hope for the two-state-solution-based peace”.
The Jews, who call it Temple Mount or Har Ha-Bayit in Hebrew, also consider this site to be sacred to their beliefs.
He said the bodies would be buried in cemeteries reserved for attackers, “as has been done in the past”. Palestinian neighborhoods in east Jerusalem have experienced frequent clashes between stone-throwing youths and Israeli security forces.
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Amnesty worldwide reported on Tuesday that it had documented in depth at least four incidents in which Palestinians were deliberately shot dead by Israeli forces when they posed no imminent threat to life, in what appeared to have been extrajudicial executions.
