Ziad Ibhais

Hardly a month goes by without Itamar Ben-Gvir looking to storm Al-Aqsa, or for a permit to impose biblical prayers there, and today he has gone a step further by declaring to the occupation army radio that he “intends to establish a Jewish synagogue in Al-Aqsa Mosque if he can.” Since Ben-Gvir assumed his position as Minister of National Security in January 2023, he has stormed Al-Aqsa Mosque six times, including three times since the outbreak of the war that the aggression on Al-Aqsa sparked in confronting him, and he has publicly confirmed the policy of allowing Jews to perform biblical rituals in Al-Aqsa four times so far.

What drives Ben Gvir to adopt this line is his affiliation with the religious Zionist movement, which is a movement that seeks to reproduce Zionism as a national and religious movement at the same time. It does not only view the Jews as a people for whom it wants to establish a political entity on the ruins of Palestine, but also that this people is at the same time a nation chosen for this land, with a divine mandate not to allow another identity to exist in it, and a divine mandate to establish the temple to be the dwelling place of the spirit of God, so that it becomes the “Kingdom of Israel” in which God resides and blesses it. It does not only rely on the Torah as a founding myth for this abolitionist project, but also seeks to apply the biblical sayings and to bring about prophecies, thus fulfilling God’s promise to it that He will send a savior, and that He will “suppress all its enemies,” and that He will “subdue the necks of the nations to it.”

In short, transforming Al-Aqsa into a temple is a missing central core of this political entity in the view of religious Zionism. It must be achieved for three reasons: first, so that the spirit of God may dwell in it and bless it, so that it may become the promised “Kingdom of Israel.” Second, to implement the Torah and restore the legendary sacrificial worship described therein, which is not complete without the presence of the temple at its center. Third, and most importantly, considering all of this a gateway to God fulfilling His promise to send the Savior, and to subject the necks of the nations to His chosen people, so that history may change from its human course to a divine course in which the miracle is manifested. The more this movement feels that it is surrounded by enemies and that it is unable to break them, the more it will look forward to that prophecy and insist on bringing it about, and thus more determined to attack Al-Aqsa Mosque.

Based on these introductions, the following can be read from Ben Gvir’s statements today:

Firstly: This statement is an expression of a practical program that has been implemented and is not a trial balloon or a mere political bombshell, despite the usual showmanship that characterizes Ben Gvir’s political performance. The central political program that brought Ben Gvir to this position is the Judaization of Al-Aqsa Mosque and changing its identity from an Islamic mosque to a Jewish temple. Upon assuming his position, he received a document of demands from the coalition of extremist Temple organizations that specified 11 items that included allowing free incursion, strengthening protection for intruders and increasing their numbers, enabling them to perform biblical rituals and bring in biblical prayer tools, and building a synagogue in Al-Aqsa, which was the fifth demand in this document.

secondly: In practice, the eastern courtyard of Al-Aqsa Mosque is treated as an “undeclared synagogue,” where the Zionist intruders perform their rituals during the incursions, while the worshipers, guards, Al-Aqsa guards, and Waqf employees are prevented from entering it or even from approaching it at a distance that allows for filming during the incursions. Therefore, Ben Gvir is trying to establish a reality that has been prepared for, within a gradual plan that looks forward to complete replacement and transforming the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque with its entire area into a temple. It must be dealt with seriously and confronted in all possible ways, the first of which is breaking the isolation of the eastern courtyard of Al-Aqsa.

Third: Ben-Gvir and Netanyahu are playing a conscious role-playing game, whereby Ben-Gvir imposes specific changes as the person directly responsible for the occupation police, and then Netanyahu or his office declares that he is adhering to the “status quo” without canceling or changing it. He means by this to confirm that he is adhering to the status quo, including these changes. He uses the status quo as an elastic term that is constantly changing, unlike its fixed definition in international law as the preservation of Al-Aqsa as it was before the outbreak of the 1967 war. Therefore, Ben-Gvir’s statement today is intended to attract Netanyahu’s response and obtain the political umbrella to impose biblical rituals in Al-Aqsa.

Fourth: In practice, since 8/13/2024, the ritual of prostration, “epic prostration,” has been performed collectively in almost every incursion into Al-Aqsa. This is a development that is taking place in Al-Aqsa for the first time since its occupation, and it builds on previous gradual attacks on the path to obliterating its Islamic identity and imposing a Jewish identity in its place, as part of the use of rituals as a tool of colonialism and domination.

Fifth: These statements come in the eleventh month of the war to try to confirm that this war and the previous one did not stop the religious replacement project in Al-Aqsa, and that changing its identity is moving forward despite the setbacks and shaking of confidence in the Zionist project imposed by those wars and the uprisings that preceded it. They renew the emphasis on a path that has been escalating since the Battle of the Sword of Jerusalem 2021, considering the aggression on Al-Aqsa as an indicator of the Zionist right’s confidence in itself, and in the capabilities and ability of the Zionist entity. As long as it continues its aggression on Al-Aqsa, it is alive and able to move forward, and this increases the impact of the Battle of Al-Aqsa in the Zionist consciousness, and the impact of any setbacks imposed in it in the future.