Tensions soar at Jerusalem shrine after rare rocket fire hits Syria

Israeli warplanes and artillery have hit targets in Syria following uncommon rocket hearth from the north-eastern neighbour, as Jewish-Muslim tensions attain a peak at a risky Jerusalem shrine with simultaneous spiritual rituals.

Thousands of Jewish worshippers gathered on the metropolis’s Western Wall, the holiest place the place Jews can pray, for a mass priestly benediction prayer service for the Passover vacation.

At the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, a walled esplanade above the Western Wall, lots of of Palestinians carried out prayers as a part of observances through the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.

Israeli police escort Jewish guests marking the vacation of Passover to the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, recognized to Muslims because the Noble Sanctuary and to Jews because the Temple Mount, within the Old City of Jerusalem, on Sunday. (AP Photo/Mahmoud Illean) (AP)

Hundreds of Jews additionally visited the Al-Aqsa compound below heavy police guard on Sunday, to whistles and spiritual chants from Palestinians protesting their presence.

Such excursions by spiritual and nationalist Jews have elevated in dimension and frequency through the years, and are considered with suspicion by many Palestinians who worry that Israel plans someday to take over the positioning or partition it.

Israeli officers say they don’t have any intention of fixing long-standing preparations that permit Jews to go to, however not pray within the Muslim-administered website.

However, the nation is now ruled by probably the most right-wing authorities in its historical past, with ultra-nationalists in senior positions.

Tensions have soared up to now week on the flashpoint shrine after an Israeli police raid on the mosque.

On a number of events, Palestinians have barricaded themselves contained in the Al-Aqsa Mosque with stones and firecrackers, demanding the proper to hope there in a single day, one thing Israel has up to now solely allowed over the past 10 days of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.

Covered in prayer shawls, Jewish males of the Cohanim Priestly caste take part in a blessing through the vacation of Passover, in entrance of the Western Wall, the holiest website the place Jews can pray, in Jerusalem’s Old City. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg) (AP)

Police eliminated them by pressure, detaining lots of and leaving dozens injured.

The violence on the shrine triggered rocket hearth by Palestinian militants from the Gaza Strip and southern Lebanon, beginning on Wednesday, and Israeli airstrikes focused each areas.

Late on Saturday and early on Sunday, militants in Syria fired rockets in two salvos towards Israel and the Israeli-annexed Golan Heights.

A Damascus-based Palestinian group loyal to the Syrian authorities claimed accountability for the primary spherical of rockets, saying it was retaliating for the Al-Aqsa raids.

Israeli police escort Jewish guests marking the vacation the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound. (AP Photo/Mahmoud Illean) (AP)

In the primary salvo, one rocket landed in a discipline within the Golan Heights. Fragments of one other destroyed missile fell into Jordanian territory close to the Syrian border, Jordan’s army reported.

In the second spherical, two of the rockets crossed the border into Israel, with one being intercepted and the second touchdown in an open space, the Israeli army mentioned.

Israel responded with artillery hearth into the realm in Syria from the place the rockets had been fired. Later, the army mentioned Israeli fighter jets attacked Syrian military websites, together with a compound of Syria’s 4th Division and radar and artillery posts.

Jewish males of the Cohanim Priestly caste take part in a blessing. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg) (AP)

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan mentioned the violence in a phone name with Israeli counterpart Isaac Herzog late Saturday, telling Herzog that Muslims couldn’t stay silent in regards to the “provocations and threats” towards the Al-Aqsa Mosque, and mentioned the hostilities which have unfold to Gaza and Lebanon shouldn’t be allowed to escalate additional.

In addition to the cross-border combating, three individuals had been killed over the weekend in Palestinian assaults in Israel and the occupied West Bank.

The funeral for 2 British-Israeli sisters, Maia and Rina Dee, who had been killed in a taking pictures was scheduled for Sunday at a cemetery within the Jewish settlement of Kfar Etzion within the occupied West Bank.

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An Italian vacationer, Alessandro Parini, 35, a lawyer from Rome, had simply arrived within the metropolis just a few hours earlier with some associates for a quick Easter vacation. He was killed Friday in a suspected car-ramming on Tel Aviv’s beachside promenade.

Over 90 Palestinians and have been killed by Israeli hearth to this point this yr, not less than half of them affiliated with militant teams, in keeping with a tally by The Associated Press. Palestinian assaults on Israelis have killed 19 individuals in that point. All however one had been civilians.