Dozens injured at Al-Aqsa mosque ahead of Israeli nationalist march – latest news

Tensions have been fuelled by the planned evictions of several Palestinian families from the Sheikh Jarrah neighbourhood in East Jerusalem.

Israel’s attorney-general secured a deferment on Sunday of a Supreme Court hearing on Monday in the long-running evictions case that had threatened to stoke more violence.

A lower court had found in favour of Jewish settlers’ claim to the land on which the Palestinians’ homes are located, a decision seen by Palestinians as an attempt by Israel to drive them out of contested Jerusalem.

US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan expressed “serious concerns” about the situation in Jerusalem, including the potential evictions, in a call with his Israeli counterpart on Sunday.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres also expressed on Sunday his concern over the situation.

Here is more on why tensions have escalated in recent days:

“The occupier plays with fire, and tampering with Jerusalem is very dangerous,” Saleh Arouri, a top Hamas official, told the militant group’s Al-Aqsa TV station.

Ofir Gendelman, a spokesman for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, claimed in a tweet that “extremist Palestinians planned well in advance to carry out riots” at the holy site.

He attached photos from the compound showing piles of stones and wooden boards, suggesting this was part of the protesters’ preparations for a confrontation.

Mr Gendelman said that Israel guarantees freedom of worship, but “not the freedom to riot and attack innocent people”.

Israeli police have reportedly decided to maintain the existing route of the controversial Jerusalem march route that it is feared will ignite further protests in the city.

The Times of Israel reported that the march will go through Damascus Gate as originally planned.

The march is due to start at 4pm local time.

CCTV footage showed a car reportedly driven by an Orthodox Jewish man crashing into protesters near the Lions’ Gate after it was pelted with rocks by a group of Palestinians.

Palestinians said the driver used his car to deliberately ram them. One man was struck by the vehicle but appeared to limp away. Police claimed the driver lost control of the vehicle.

The driver was shown in photos with an improvised bandage on his head and blood on his shirt, next to his damaged car, and guarded by a policeman with his gun drawn.

The Palestinian Red Crescent has told The Independent 305 people have been injured, of which 228 were hospitalised.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has accused the global media of reporting “erroneously and misleadingly” on the situation in Jerusalem.

In a Monday statement, he said: “A struggle is now being waged for the heart of Jerusalem. It is not a new struggle. It is the struggle between intolerance and tolerance, between law-breaking violence and law and order…

“We insist on ensuring the rights of everyone, this occasionally requires taking a strong stand as the officers of the Israel Police, and our security forces, are doing at the moment. We back them in this just struggle.

“Of course, these things are being expressed erroneously and misleadingly in the global media. In the end truth will win but we must constantly reiterate it.”

Samir, a Palestinian producer who was reporting beside the al-Aqsa mosque told The Independent that there had been back and forth between the Palestinians and the Israeli forces all day. 

He said soldiers had shot rubber bullets from the roof of the buildings on the west side of the al-Aqsa, and most of the injuries he saw were to the face. 

He said that when the security forces entered the most they threw gas grenades and stun grenades inside after closing the gates, initially preventing the wounded from getting out. 

“The situation is calmer right now as it is praying time, but the back and forth will start again,” he added.

Also at the mosque, a volunteer Palestinian medic, who asked not to be named for security reasons, told The Independent the Israelis had used an “unusual amount of force”. 

“More than 1000 soldiers attacked al-Aqsa , hitting people mostly on the face and their head with rubber bullets.”

The Independent could not independently verify that number.

Major General Rassan Alian, the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT), an Israeli military agency that coordinates Israeli government operations in the West Bank, said “Israel will not stand for any disruption of the safety, law and order, and the stability of security”.

In a statement, released as the violence worsened in the Old City, he said: “The stability of security and of civil life [is] in everyone’s interest.

“It is not violence and terrorism that should be dominating the agenda, but the economic and social welfare of the residents.”