League of Arab States strongly condemns hundreds of settlers' incursion into Al-Aqsa Mosque, warns against attempts to alter its established historical and legal status

​The General Secretariat of the League of Arab States, represented by the Palestine and Occupied Arab Territories Sector, condemned in the strongest terms the incursion by hundreds of Israeli settlers into Al-Aqsa Mosque on 13 August under the protection of the Israeli occupying forces and the performance of Jewish religious rituals and prayers in the Mosque compound.

The Secretariat described these actions as a flagrant violation of the sanctity of Al-Aqsa Mosque, international law and relevant resolutions of international legitimacy.

According to information received from the Jerusalem Awqaf Directorate, 584 settlers entered Al-Aqsa Mosque during the morning hours through the Moroccan Gate, under police protection.

The Mosque compound also witnessed the collective performance of Jewish religious rituals, in a dangerous escalation aimed at imposing new realities within the Mosque and altering its established historical and legal status.

The General Secretariat warned of the grave implications of these continued Israeli practices, which directly undermine the established historical and legal status of Al-Aqsa Mosque and constitute a systematic attempt to entrench its temporal and spatial division.

Such actions pose a serious threat to freedom of worship and to peace and security in the region.

The General Secretariat reaffirmed that Al-Aqsa Mosque, in its entirety, covering an area of 144 dunams, is an exclusive place of worship for Muslims, and that the Jerusalem Awqaf and Al-Aqsa Mosque Affairs Directorate is the competent authority responsible for administering its affairs, in accordance with the established historical and legal status.

It further held Israel, as the occupying Power, fully responsible for these repeated violations and demanded it immediately halt all incursions, provocations and practices aimed at altering the identity and established historical and legal status of Al-Aqsa Mosque, and to respect international law, international humanitarian law and relevant United Nations resolutions.

The General Secretariat called on the international community, particularly the United Nations Security Council, to assume its responsibilities in bringing the escalating Israeli violations to an end, providing protection for the Palestinian people and their holy sites, and preventing continued impunity and the imposition of faits accomplis by force.

The League of Arab States reiterated its firm position that East Jerusalem is the capital of the State of Palestine, and that all Israeli measures aimed at altering the status, identity and Arab, Islamic and Christian character of the city are null and void and illegitimate, and create neither rights nor legal effect.

The League further stressed that the continued escalation at Al-Aqsa Mosque and the Islamic and Christian holy sites in occupied Jerusalem constitutes a provocation to the feelings of hundreds of millions of Arabs, Muslims and Christians, and risks inflaming the situation and undermining prospects for peace and stability in the region.