Ben Gvir Confirms Jews Prayed Out Loud and on Full Display at Temple Mount

Israel’s head of national security, Itamar Ben Gvir, is evoking the wrath of political and religious opponents after confirming Sunday that Jews brought prayer books onto the Temple Mount for an official service, in defiance of the longtime “Status Quo.” The Status Quo is a gentleman’s agreement reached in 1967 after the Six-Day War in which Israel promised to leave the Temple Mount — known by Muslims as Haram al-Sharif, the site of the Al-Aqsa mosque — in the hands of an Islamic administration run by Jordan. Under the arrangement, Israel’s security forces would guard the site.Jews and Christians would be allowed to visit under strict conditions, escorted by police, through one entrance, and would not be permitted to worship or bring prayer books. The deal was reaffirmed in a 1994 peace agreement between Israel and Jordan.However, the arrangement has been slowly chipped away since 2015, when a Magistrate Court in Jerusalem affirmed that Jews and Christians are permitted to pray in silence at the site. Since then, the number of Jews ascending to pray quietly has exploded. That changed Sunday, when Jews were out in full force, holding prayer books and performing ritual priestly blessings. “The struggle for full and equal freedom of worship on the Temple Mount continues and gains are being made every day. Greater access and greater freedom will come,” wrote a religious group, the Temple Institute, which calls for rebuilding the holy site.“This morning on the Temple Mount: Jews praying with siddurim. Still no blanket permit but an initial experiment aimed at ensuring the Middle East doesn’t lose its mind over this. History,” added a conservative columnist and Temple Mount tour guide, Arnon Segal, on X.In April, Mr. Ben Gvir’s lawyer, David Peter, affirmed to Israel’s High Court that the Status Quo has been modified by Mr. Ben Gvir, who as a Cabinet member to the right of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyau and head of Israel’s police force, is within his authority to order security forces not to enforce the restrictions. “Yes, Minister Ben Gvir did change the situation on the Temple Mount— changed it big time. Changed it completely.” Mr. Peter reportedly said at the time. The comments came as part of a series of petitions against Mr. Ben Gvir brought to the court by Israel’s attorney general, Gali Baharav-Miara, and others who say the minister has interfered with police operations, including promotions. The petitioners demand that Mr. Ben Gvir be judicially or administratively removed from his post. Mr. Netanyahu told the court last week that he had no grounds to remove him and would not do so.The Temple Mount, the holiest site in Judaism, is the location where Jews constructed the first and second temples, and where they were torn down during Babylonian and Roman rule over Jerusalem in 586 B.C.E. and year 70 of the Common Era, respectively. The destruction of the temples is mourned on Tisha B’Av, the ninth of Av, which is considered the saddest day in the Jewish calendar.Mr. Ben Gvir, whose party joined Mr. Netanyahu’s coalition in late 2022, has been moving toward upending the Status Quo for years. In early 2023, he visited the Temple Mount on a mourning day in the Jewish calendar, the 10th of Tevet, stirring an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council.In 2024, he repeated the visit on the anniversary of Tisha B’Av, earning the rebuke of the United Nations and a statement by President Biden’s secretary of state, Antony Blinken, calling for preservation of the Status Quo. In 2025, he once more enraged Palestinian Arabs and Arab nations by visiting the Temple Mount and praying for the end of the war with Hamas and the return of hostages taken during the October 7, 2023, attacks. Since then, however, the Temple Mount has been visited by tens of thousands of Jews, including more than 3,700 who ascended on Tisha B’Av last month. The government of Jordan strongly condemned the visits, which were monitored by Israeli police in line with the Status Quo.Mr. Netanyahu, who has previously stated his support for the Status Quo, has not publicly commented about Sunday’s event.Muslim observers and Israel opponents also condemned Sunday’s open prayers by Jews on the Mount. “A sad day for the Muslim world, which has continued to neglect Israeli violations across all of the holy sites, Jerusalem, the West Bank, and Gaza,” a Palestinian political analyst and instructor at Kings College in London, Ziad Khalil Abu Zayyad, wrote on X.“Regardless of happenstance, this ends in blood,” predicted an attorney, Daniel Seidemann, who is a former consultant to Prime Minister Ehud Barak and who works to defend Palestinian interests in Jerusalem. “Do we really need to douse those flames with more kerosene? Do you really believe that this will go unnoticed, eliciting no response? The torrents of events in recent years has dulled our senses and clouded our judgment.”

Ben Gvir Confirms Jews Prayed Out Loud and on Full Display at Temple Mount

Ben Gvir Confirms Jews Prayed Out Loud and on Full Display at Temple Mount

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