Sheikh Ekrima Sabri head of the Higher Islamic Council in Occupied Jerusalem has warned that the Islamic Awqaf Department in the holy city is gradually losing its control over the management of the Aqsa Mosque especially in the eastern area where the Bab al-Rahma prayer hall is located.
In recent press remarks Sheikh Sabri highlighted the gravity of the situation at the Aqsa Mosque and held the Arab countries responsible for this situation through forsaking Jerusalem and the Mosque and normalizing their ties with the Israeli occupation state which encouraged it to persist in its crimes and violations.
Sheikh Sabri who also works as preacher at the Aqsa Mosque pointed out that the occupation state had been planning in previous years to convert the Bab al-Rahma prayer area into a synagogue but its plan was interrupted by its reopening in February 2019 by Muslim worshipers and Awqaf officials.
He stressed the need for the Awqaf Department to assume its duties at the Aqsa Mosque and prevent the occupation state and its forces from overstepping the limits describing the Israeli measures against the Islamic holy site as gross aggression.
The Aqsa Mosque compound’s Bab al-Rahma prayer area had been closed off to Muslim worshippers for about 16 years before it was reopened in February 2019 after hundreds of Palestinians forced their way into its passages and prayer hall.
The Bab al-Rahma structure is located inside the Aqsa Mosque but the Israeli occupation police — which has no jurisdiction over the Islamic holy site — shut it down in 2003 and justified the arbitrary measure by claiming that the Islamic society operating there was associated with Hamas.
