
Itamar Ben gvir, Israel's new far-right minister of national security, attends the weekly cabinet meeting in Jerusalem on Jan. 3, 2023. (Credit: Atef Safadi/POOL/AFP)
The Lebanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs condemned on Tuesday the "assault" on the Al-Aqsa mosque in East Jerusalem, a holy place at the heart of Israeli-Palestinian tensions, by the new Israeli minister of national security and figure of the extreme right, Itamar Ben Gvir.
"This serious violation of the sanctity of the Al-Aqsa mosque and the entire holy place by a minister of the new Israeli government reveals the extremist policies that the Israeli government has begun to practice towards the Palestinian people and their rights," read a statement from the Lebanese ministry.
The statement denounces "the repeated attacks against Palestinians … and the modification of the characteristics and reality of the city of Jerusalem."
A member of the most right-wing government in the history of Israel, Ben Gvir was accompanied by members of the Israeli security forces during his visit Tuesday morning.
Islam's third holiest site and Judaism's holiest site, the Al-Aqsa mosque (known in Judaism as the Temple Mount) is located in the Old City of Jerusalem, an Israeli-occupied and annexed Palestinian sector.
The Lebanese ministry sees in these "practices, a clear statement by the Netanyahu government of its policy of aggression and its rejection of peace efforts aimed at achieving a solution based on two states."
It calls, in this context, the UN Security Council to "assume its responsibilities, and do what is necessary to … force the Israeli government to respect international resolutions."
Under a historical status quo, non-Muslims can visit the site at specific times but cannot pray there.
In recent years, however, a growing number of Jews, often nationalists, have been praying there surreptitiously, a gesture denounced as a "provocation" by the Palestinians and Arab countries.