Despite being closed: Jewish pilgrims break through police barricades to enter Temple Mt [Watch]
On Jerusalem Day, Jewish-Israeli pilgrims who were frustrated that the Temple Mount was closed to them during the holiday, scaled the fence surrounding the Temple Mount despite police resistance.
Hundreds of Jewish worshippers gathered at the Holy site which was liberated exactly 54 years ago today. The Temple Mount was closed by the police due to heavy Arab rioting at the site.
Israel is undergoing a wave of attacks on all fronts which includes rockets from Gaza, terrorist attacks in the Biblical homeland, and violent riots in the neighborhood surrounding the Tomb of Shimon the Righteous, a Kohen Gadol (High Priest) during the Second Temple period. But the worst violence, that on the Temple Mount, highlights the true nature of the conflict; and end-of-days pre-Messiah battle for the Mountain of God purchased by King David for fifty shekels of silver 3,000 years ago. The violence crescendoed on Monday, Yom Yerushalayim, the 54th anniversary of the IDF victory in the 1967 Six-Day War that opened all of Jerusalem to the Jews for the first time in 2,000 years.
Police Commissioner Yaakov Shabtai announced on Sunday that the Temple Mount would be closed to Jews on Jerusalem Day despite having announced earlier in the week that it would be open to Jews. The police statement announced that freedom of worship, that is to day exclusively for Muslims, would remain in place on the Temple Mount, but that rioting would not be accepted.
The Arabs responded by intensifying the Temple Mount riots that were already taking place during the Ramadan prayers. A decision by the police on whether to allow the annual Jerusalem Day parade to take place as planned is still pending.
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