International News
Israeli minister’s visit to Jerusalem holy site triggers furious backlash in Mideast
Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir made a ‘controversial’ visit to the flashpoint holy site of Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in East Jerusalem, triggering a furious backlash from the Muslim world in the Middle East.
Nabil Abu Rudeineh, the spokesman of the Palestinian presidency, slammed Ben-Gvir’s visit to Al-Aqsa on Tuesday, the first by an Israeli minister in nearly five years, as “a challenge to the Palestinian people, the Arab nation, and the international community”, Xinhua news agency reported.
“The Israeli authorities’ attempts to change the existing historical and legal reality in Al-Aqsa by perpetuating its temporal division by dividing it spatially are rejected and doomed to failure,” he said, warning that Jerusalem and its holy sites are “a red line that cannot be crossed”.
Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammed Ishtaye told the weekly cabinet of the Palestinian Authority that Ben-Gvir’s storming of the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, the third holiest site in Islam, constitutes a “serious challenge to the feelings of the Palestinian people”.
Hazem Qassem, a spokesman of the Gaza Strip’s ruling faction Hamas, condemned in a statement the Israeli minister’s visit as “a continuation of the Zionist’s occupation aggression,” vowing that the Palestinian people “will continue defending their holy places and Al-Aqsa Mosque.”
Jordan summoned the Israeli ambassador in Amman and delivered a strongly worded protest message demanding Israel immediately stop all such violations.
“Storming of the Al-Aqsa Mosque by an Israeli minister and violating the mosque’s sacredness is a condemned and provocative action and represents a stark violation of international law, as well as of the historical and legal status quo in Jerusalem and its holy sites,” Jordan’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Sinan Majali said in a statement.
The Egyptian Foreign Ministry expressed its regret over Ben-Gvir’s visit to the Al-Aqsa compound, stressing its total rejection of “any unilateral measures that violate the legal and historical status quo in Jerusalem”.
In Lebanon, the foreign ministry condemned Ben-Gvir’s visit as a “serious violation of the sanctity of Al-Aqsa Mosque”, which “indicates the direction of the extremist policies the Israeli government has adopted toward the Palestinian people and their rights and sanctities”.
Voices of strong condemnation were also heard from the Gulf states against the new Israeli minister’s visit to the holy site in Jerusalem.
Condemning the “provocative action” by Ben-Gvir, the Saudi foreign ministry said the Israeli practices “undermine the international peace efforts and international principles and norms regarding respecting religious sanctities”.
The United Arab Emirates (UAE) also strongly condemned Ben-Gvir’s “storming of Al-Aqsa Mosque,” urging Israel to “halt serious and provocative violations” at the holy site, said the UAE foreign ministry in a statement. The UAE signed a normalization deal with Israel in 2020.
Qatar and Oman both denounced the far-right Israeli minister’s visit as a violation of international laws and all Muslims, according to separate statements issued by the foreign ministries of the two Gulf countries.
Meanwhile, the Iranian Foreign Ministry blasted Ben-Gvir’s visit to the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound as “sacrilege” of the holy site and a violation of international law.
Such “sacrilegious acts” amount to an affront to the values and sanctities of the world’s Muslims, the ministry’s spokesman Nasser Kanaani said in a statement published on the ministry’s website, warning against the “adventurist and provocative” actions of the new hardline Israeli government.
Turkey, which restored its full diplomatic ties with Israel in 2022 after years of tensions, also denounced Ben-Gvir’s “provocative visit”, said the Turkish Foreign Ministry. It urged Israel to “act responsibly to prevent such provocations that will violate the status and sanctity of holy places in Jerusalem and escalate the tension in the region”.
Responding to the outcry, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the longest-serving Israeli leader that just returned to power after winning the November parliamentary election last year, affirmed in a statement issued by his office his commitment to “strictly maintaining the status quo” at the Al-Aqsa compound, adding that visits by ministers to the site are not considered “a change in the status quo”.
Ben-Gvir, known as an ultra-nationalist, was sworn in as Israel’s national security minister last week, as Netanyahu’s new extreme-right coalition government took office.
The Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, known to Jews as the most sacred site, is regarded by Muslims as their third holiest site.
The holy site has been administered by the Jerusalem Islamic Waqf, a Jordanian body, since 1948. Under a 1967 agreement between Israel and Jordan, non-Muslim worshippers can visit the compound but are prohibited from praying there.
Tehran, May 5: Five civilians were killed in US attacks on cargo boats, Iran’s semi-official Tasnim news agency reported on Tuesday.
Following the claim by the US military that it had targeted six Iranian speedboats, and given that none of Iran’s combat vessels was hit, local sources were consulted to verify the nature of the incident, according to Xinhua, which quoted the report.
It was determined that US forces had attacked two small civilian cargo boats, which were travelling from Khasab along the Omani coast toward Iran, killing five civilian passengers onboard, it said.
Brad Cooper, chief of US Central Command, said on Monday that the US military had sunk six Iranian small boats in the Strait of Hormuz.
The Iranian boats were struck by US Apache and MH-60 Seahawk helicopters, Cooper told a news conference.
Meanwhile, two US Navy destroyers have passed through the Strait of Hormuz and entered the Gulf after navigating an Iranian barrage, US media outlet CBS News reported.
The USS Truxtun and USS Mason, supported by Apache helicopters and other aircraft, faced a series of coordinated threats during the passage, said the report, citing Pentagon officials, who spoke under condition of anonymity, on Monday night (local time).
No US warship was struck, though Iran launched small boats, missiles and drones against them as a sustained barrage, the officials were quoted as saying.
None of the projectiles launched by Iran reached the US vessels, they said, adding that the US military’s assisting efforts, bolstered by air support, successfully intercepted or deterred each incoming threat, reports Xinhua news agency.
US President Donald Trump told Fox News on Monday that the Iranians are “more malleable” than they were before.
In a phone interview with Fox News, the president threatened that if Iran targets US ships in the Strait of Hormuz as the Pentagon begins operations to restore commercial shipping transit through the strait, they would be “blown off the face of the Earth.”
However, in another phone interview with ABC News on Monday, Trump stopped short of saying Iran’s Monday attacks had violated the US-Iran ceasefire.
“[It was] not heavy firing,” Trump said, downplaying the attacks.
Brad Cooper, chief of the US Central Command, told reporters earlier on Monday that Iranian forces had launched “multiple cruise missiles, drones, and small boats at ships we are protecting.”
US forces have sunk six Iranian small boats targeting civilian vessels in the Strait of Hormuz and intercepted several Iranian missiles and drones, said Cooper.
Iran later rejected the US claims, saying that “no commercial vessels or oil tankers” have transited the Strait of Hormuz, the semi-official Tasnim News Agency reported.
On February 28, the United States and Israel launched joint strikes on Tehran and other Iranian cities, killing then-Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, senior military commanders and civilians. Iran responded with waves of missile and drone attacks on Israel and US targets across the region and restricted passage through the Strait of Hormuz for vessels linked to Israel and the United States.
A ceasefire took effect on April 8, followed by talks between Iranian and US delegations in Islamabad that ended without a deal.
Tehran, May 4: The Navy of Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guard Corps (IRGC) on Monday claimed that it hit a US Navy frigate with two missiles that sought to pass through the Strait of Hormuz, the semi-official Fars news agency reported.
The US frigate, which had set sail near Iran’s southern port city of Jask to cross the Strait of Hormuz “in violation of the traffic and shipping security,” was hit after ignoring the Iranian naval forces’ warning, Fars cited local sources as saying.
It added that after being struck, the frigate was forced to retreat and flee from the region.
However, according to a subsequent report by Axios, a senior US official denied that a US ship was hit by Iranian missiles, Xinhua news agency reported.
Iran has repeatedly announced that no movement is possible through the Strait of Hormuz without its official permission, and ignoring this warning will be met with a decisive response from the Iranian armed forces, according to Fars.
US President Donald Trump said Sunday the United States will guide ships stranded in the Strait of Hormuz safely out of the restricted waterway on Monday.
In response to Trump’s claim, Iran’s main military command, Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters, warned on Monday that “any foreign armed forces, especially the aggressive US army, will be attacked if they intend to approach and enter the Strait of Hormuz,” according to the official news agency IRNA.
Iran tightened its grip on the Strait of Hormuz beginning February 28, when it barred safe passage to vessels belonging to or affiliated with Israel and the United States following joint strikes on Iranian territory.
The United States imposed its anti-Iran blockade on the Strait of Hormuz after post-ceasefire negotiations with Tehran on April 11 and 12 failed to lead to an agreement.
Tehran, May 3: Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei condemned US President Donald Trump’s remarks that called the US seizure of Iranian vessels “piracy.”
“The president of the United States has openly described the unlawful seizure of Iranian vessels as ‘piracy,’ brazenly boasting that ‘we act like pirates,'” Baghaei said in an X post.
“This was no verbal slip. It was a direct and damning admission of the criminal nature of their actions against international maritime navigation,” Baghaei added.
Trump on Friday bragged that the US Navy acted “like pirates” in its blockade of Iranian ports. “We took over the ship, we took over the cargo, we took over the oil. It’s a very profitable business,” Trump said at an event in Florida, Xinhua news agency reported.
Baghaei called on the international community, UN member states, and the UN secretary-general to firmly reject any normalization of such “blatant violations” of international law.
The United States imposed its anti-Iran blockade on the Strait of Hormuz after post-ceasefire negotiations with Tehran in Pakistan’s capital Islamabad on April 11-12 failed to yield an agreement.
The ceasefire between Iran, the United States and Israel took effect on April 8 following 40 days of fighting. On February 28, the United States and Israel launched joint attacks on Tehran and other Iranian cities, killing Iran’s then-Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, senior commanders and civilians.
Iran responded with waves of missile and drone strikes targeting Israel and US bases and assets in the Middle East, while tightening its grip on the Strait of Hormuz and denying safe passage to vessels linked to Israel and the United States.
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