Muhammad Ahmad Hussein, Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, has been banned from the al-Aqsa Mosque compound following his arrest on Friday [Getty]
Israeli authorities have banned the grand mufti of Jerusalem from entering the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound for one week.
Sheikh Muhammad Hussein was arrested by Israeli forces after he delivered his sermon during Fridays prayers on 10 July, the Jerusalem Governorate said in a post on Facebook.
Authorities later released him and served him with a one-week ban from entering the compound, it added.
In a statement to The New Arab, the Jerusalem Governorate said it “strongly condemns” the decision, calling it a “serious violation of the fundamental right to freedom of worship “.
“Israeli authorities frequently impose bans and restrictions on Islamic figures under broad and unsubstantiated security pretexts, without presenting transparent legal justifications. Such measures are aimed at limiting the role of religious leadership in Jerusalem and facilitating greater Israeli control over Al-Aqsa Mosque and its surrounding area,” it said.
Israeli authorities have not commented on the arrest.
The incident is the latest in a string of Israeli measures targeting Muslim and Christian holy sites in Jerusalem.
Israeli raids at Al-Aqsa – Islam’s third-holiest site – have surged under the far-right government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in violation of the decades-old status quo.
Arrangements introduced by Israel after the 1967 war left the Jerusalem Islamic Waqf in charge of administering the compound, with Muslim prayer there and Jewish worship directed instead to the Western Wall.
In practice, however, this arrangement has been increasingly eroded. Since 2022, Israeli authorities have allowed far-right Jewish extremists to conduct regular prayers inside the compound and have detained the grand mufti on multiple occasions.
In January, Netanyahu backed moves to loosen restrictions on Jewish access to the site, insisting that these steps do not violate the existing arrangements.
The push to allow Jewish prayer has been led by far-right national security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, who has regularly participated in settler incursions into the compound.
Incursions at Al-Aqsa are taking place at a time of record settlement expansion in the occupied West Bank, a sharp rise in settler violence and accelerating Palestinian displacement.
More than 1,100 Palestinians have been killed since October 2023 in the occupied West Bank, and tens of thousands have been forced from their homes under what rights groups say is a state policy of ethnic cleansing.
