Status Quo in Al-Aqsa Mosque

Israeli politicians of different orientations and ranks, right and left, rant about their persistent and continuous claim of conservatism and respect for the "status quo" in the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque. This matter has become a cracked record to justify the Israeli settlement policy for the Israeli governmental and non-governmental violations of the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque.

This Latin term, Status Co, began to be used in the days of the Ottoman Empire, when it issued a firman in 1757, to decide the continuation of the status quo between the Christian denominations as a result of their differences in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem and the cradle in Bethlehem, then it was confirmed in the years 1852 and 1853 and the rest Respected to this day among the various Christian denominations. The days of the Israeli occupation were disturbed in the issue of the Copts and the Ethiopians, which took on a political rather than a legal character, at a time of hostility with the Arab Republic of Egypt and the full relations with Haile Selassie, Emperor of Abyssinia, and the intervention of the Israeli judiciary in it through the Israeli Supreme Court of Justice to advocate for the Abyssinian ally.

After that, the European countries recognized this firman through the Paris Conference, and the Treaty of Berlin in 1878 decided to adopt the "status quo" by deciding in Article 62 of it that no modifications can be made to the current situation on all holy places, so that it includes all Christian and Islamic holy places and considered the mosque The blessed Al-Aqsa is an Islamic sanctuary, and the Ottoman Empire has the right to manage and rebuild it. This commitment was inherited by the Islamic Endowments Department in Jerusalem.

Thus, the "status quo" has become part of customary international law, and it means "the current or existing matters in a region remain as they are and do not affect modification, change or cancellation", especially with regard to the social and / or political and / or religious and / or social situation and/or military. And all countries must respect and implement it. Indeed, the status quo has become stronger than all domestic laws and transcends them if a conflict occurs between the internal law and what is called the status quo or the existing one.

The status quo in the Holy Land "Palestine" remained the same after the fall of the Ottoman Empire and the British occupation of Palestine, claiming that Britain respected the status quo in the holy places and religious freedom, until bloody disputes took place between Jews and Muslims over Al-Buraq Wall, which is the western wall of Al-Aqsa Mosque, and forms part of it. It is inseparable from Al-Aqsa Mosque, because Al-Aqsa Mosque is 144 dunums, including the Dome of the Rock, the Bab al-Rahma chapel, terraces, louvres, sidewalks, surfaces, domes, doors, and others within this area. And he devotes himself to this understanding throughout this article.

As a result of that, and the arrival of the League of Nations committee and the presentation of its recommendations, after it had listened and examined the matter, it decided that the Al-Buraq Wall is a private Islamic property, and that only Muslims have full and undiminished real rights in it, and that the Jews’ prayer in front of it is a way of concession from Muslims to the Jews, and therefore it was forbidden for the Jews to blow the trumpet and set tables and curtains Wall cleaning or restoration. The British Mandate government adopted the League of Nations report through binding British mandate legislation in 1931. This British law has not been repealed to this day and the Israeli authorities have ignored its implementation.

After 1967, the Israeli forces occupied and annexed the city of Jerusalem, and despite their occupation of Al-Aqsa Mosque and various religious places, they claimed from the outset that they respect the status quo that existed before 1967.

This was aided by an Orthodox Jewish religious fatwa that prohibited Jews from entering the Al-Aqsa Mosque building and courtyard. Rather, the Israeli authority - a speck of ashes in the eyes - issued a law to protect the holy places and authorized the Minister of Religious Affairs to define them, as he identified 135 religious sites, all of which are Jewish par excellence.

The United Nations resolutions came successively, whether from the United Nations General Assembly or the Security Council, confirming the concept of customary international law for the current situation that we referred to above. The General Assembly of the United Nations early issued its first resolution No. 2235 in 1967, in which it considered all Israeli measures in Jerusalem null and called on Israel to cancel them and refrain from taking any action that would change the legal status of the city of Jerusalem. As for the Security Council, it issued Resolution No. 252 in 1968, in which it considered all administrative, legislative, and actions that Israel had taken in Jerusalem null and void, and called on the international community to nullify them. Rolled confirmed decisions of the former.

In the beginning, the Islamic Endowments Department of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan implemented the status quo on Al-Aqsa Mosque (the mosque) and lowered the Israeli flag from the mast of the mosque despite their seizure of the Al-Tanzi school and Al-Buraq Wall, both of which constitute a flagrant violation of the rule of the status quo.

Despite this, the Endowment Department thankfully took charge of guarding the mosque, appointing its guards, financing them, paying their salaries, arranging the place, opening and closing it, and specifying the hours for that, and it undertook restoration and cleaning of it, especially after the fire of the Salah al-Din minbar in 1969. The Islamic Endowments modernized the electricity and water network, and even renovated the Marwani Mosque and many other mosques. One of the vital facilities of the mosque without permission from the occupying Israeli authority according to the principle or rule of the status quo. In fact, a sharp and heated debate was taking place between the endowments, the Israeli authority, and the Israeli Jerusalem municipality with its successive presidents, which were trying in various ways to show their power and control, which they called their alleged sovereignty, even in small matters.

However, the matter began to take another dangerous turn after the year 2000, particularly after the ill-fated visit of Ariel Sharon.

Various Israeli security forces began to intervene in the mosque, so they placed a police station inside the mosque, and police battalions were placed to monitor the internal situation in the mosque at all its doors, allowing whoever they wanted to enter and banning whom they wanted, and they monitor anything, whether from building materials or for restoration or other purposes, prohibition And a passport. Rather, police patrols were conducted inside the mosque, examining the inside and outside, prohibiting and allowing entry, preempting the identities of some, and summoning professors, endowment employees, students of science and religion, and guards, and forbidding them to enter the mosque, but rather expelling them from the mosque for days, weeks, and months, both male and female. And she continued those violations of the status quo, as she stormed the building and trampled on its carpets and floors with the carpets of its security men.

They persecuted the Muslims and beat the worshipers and the seclusion, causing harm to them, and wreaked havoc in the medical clinic, and smashed the ornate windows that are considered a religious artistic heritage. Is this not considered a flagrant breach of the status quo in the mosque, or do they think that we are so naive that we do not understand or distinguish the current situation from other actions? In fact, the actions of the Israeli security men are not only a breach of the status quo, but rather constitute crimes in the strict sense of international criminal law. If Karim Khan, the Prosecutor General of the International Criminal Court, was honest and faithful to the Rome Statute, he would open a criminal investigation into the attacks that took place in the mosque against worshipers, female chapels, and retreaters.

These aggressive actions indisputably violate the status quo and will only lead to more bloodshed and will not lead to the construction of a temple, nor to the division of the mosque, neither temporally nor spatially. Rather, the settlers' daily storming of the mosque, regardless of their number, prayers, movements, hymns, "epic prostrations" and dances, is a serious breach of the status quo according to the understanding of customary and written international law.

The current situation includes, among other things, religious freedom within the existing situation before the war, status quo ante bellum, and this includes the freedom of worshipers at all times of the day, morning and evening, according to the arrangements made by the Islamic endowments, and not within the electronic conditional doors. This includes the right of all Muslims of all races, races, languages and colors to enter the mosque and pray in it, the time they wish without restriction or condition, and no one has the right to stand in their way. The status quo paves the way for absolute freedom of worship and allows all Muslims to perform pilgrimages to the mosque and perform their prayers there, whether from the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, Jordan or other countries. It is the right of Muslims to carry their publications, books, and their needs in the courtyards of the mosque without censorship.

The current situation is also represented in excavations, maintenance and restoration, and this is something that the Israeli authorities have constantly violated and insist on violating in all occasions and circumstances. It is the right of the Islamic Waqf to conduct the excavations required by its work in places that are wanted or required by religious or archaeological need or necessity. In addition, Israeli excavations under the mosque are prohibited, not according to the rule of the status quo, but according to the Hague Convention of 1954, the Fourth Geneva Convention of 1949, and the Fourth Hague Convention of 1907. This was confirmed by UNESCO in its decision in 2016 and subsequent decisions.

In order to practically weaken the legal status of Muslims in the mosque, the Israeli occupying authority has banned any electrical and water renovations and any renovations after a long-term occupation that lasted five and a half decades, and the occupying authority continues to prohibit such vital measures for Muslims and worships them to pressure and constrain them even though these matters are necessary The current situation as drawn by jurists of customary international law. After more than five decades of Israeli occupation, the mosque needs a new suit of lighting, ventilation, lighting, water, heating, air conditioning, drains, tiles, agriculture, umbrellas, terraces, clinics, fire stations, toilets, water taps for ablution and vital facilities. All that was mentioned is an urgent need to implement the so-called status quo, and not what the Israeli politicians accept.

The true meaning of the status quo or status quo is what was prevalent before 1967 in the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque in terms of the behavior of Muslims, regardless of their gender, race, language or color. Sponsorship of the Islamic Endowments Department in all the facilities of the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque, building or empty, roofed or not, in 144 dunums, and other than that, it is misleading and manipulation of words, for truth does not resist its authority and it is inevitably victorious over falsehood and tyranny!!!