Israel Bans Academic Program Promoting Demolition of ‘Dome of the Rock’ Mosque

A general view shows part of Jerusalem's Old City and the Dome of the Rock December 5, 2017. REUTERS/Ammar Awad
A general view shows part of Jerusalem's Old City and the Dome of the Rock December 5, 2017. REUTERS/Ammar Awad
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Israel Bans Academic Program Promoting Demolition of ‘Dome of the Rock’ Mosque

A general view shows part of Jerusalem's Old City and the Dome of the Rock December 5, 2017. REUTERS/Ammar Awad
A general view shows part of Jerusalem's Old City and the Dome of the Rock December 5, 2017. REUTERS/Ammar Awad

The Israeli Education Ministry decided to remove the “Student for the Temple Mount” group from the academic program in Jewish schools.

The group include activists who support the establishment of the "Third Temple" (the Jewish Temple) on the ruins of Omar Mosque (Dome of the Rock in Al Aqsa Mosque)

The decision followed leaked information that the group is setting up a topic called "Knowing the Importance of the Temple Mount," which speaks of the Aqsa as the Temple Mount

The topic points out that the Dome of the Rock Mosque replaced the Jewish temple and must be rebuilt in its original place, which means an explicit call to demolish the mosque.

According to Israel’s Channel 10 TV report, the program is made by the far right-wing movement "Im Tirtzu.”

The report said that this movement is broadcasting to school students the controversial agenda of the Temple Mount and its activists.

The group is linked to the banned Kahane gang, which calls for the expulsion of Palestinian Arabs from their homeland and the cleansing of Israel of non-Jews.

Many organizations were established from this group, and they have carried out practical activities to spread despair among Palestinians to leave and carried out terror operations, during which Aqsa Mosque and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem were burnt.

They also published maps of the Temple Mount, removing the Dome of the Rock’s picture from them and replacing it with the Jewish Temple.

In addition to that, a cannon was also seized on the roof of a house in Jerusalem, and its nozzle was pointed towards the Aqsa Mosque.

This group was banned from the Israeli law because of the seriousness of its racist rhetoric, but its activists knew how to continue their activity and promote their ideas in other contexts.



Lebanon: Israel Says ‘No Escaping a Sharp, Quick War with Hezbollah’

A Lebanese family stands next to a destroyed building that were hit by an Israeli airstrike, in Aita al-Shaab, a Lebanese border village with Israel, south Lebanon, Saturday, June 29, 2024. (AP Photo/Mohammed Zaatari)
A Lebanese family stands next to a destroyed building that were hit by an Israeli airstrike, in Aita al-Shaab, a Lebanese border village with Israel, south Lebanon, Saturday, June 29, 2024. (AP Photo/Mohammed Zaatari)
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Lebanon: Israel Says ‘No Escaping a Sharp, Quick War with Hezbollah’

A Lebanese family stands next to a destroyed building that were hit by an Israeli airstrike, in Aita al-Shaab, a Lebanese border village with Israel, south Lebanon, Saturday, June 29, 2024. (AP Photo/Mohammed Zaatari)
A Lebanese family stands next to a destroyed building that were hit by an Israeli airstrike, in Aita al-Shaab, a Lebanese border village with Israel, south Lebanon, Saturday, June 29, 2024. (AP Photo/Mohammed Zaatari)

Lebanon’s Hezbollah group intensified its strikes on Sunday on military positions in Israel using heavy missiles following Israeli strikes on a Lebanese town in South Lebanon that killed three Hezbollah fighters.
Israeli warplanes flew for the first time at low altitude and broke the sound barrier over Mount Lebanon.
This came in parallel with new Israeli threats voiced by Israel's Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich who said there is no escaping "a sharp, quick war” with Hezbollah.
He said “the war in Lebanon will carry a price, and I don't underestimate it, but any price we pay today will be much smaller than what we will be forced to pay in the future, if we don't act."
Earlier, Israel’s Defense Minister Yoav Gallanthad said that Tel Aviv does not seek a war with Hezbollah but that his army is prepared for one.
On Sunday, Israel said that after surveillance, its warplanes hit a “military” building in the southern Lebanese town of Hula it said was housing Hezbollah fighters.
It also said its forces spotted a fighter entering a military building of Hezbollah in the village of Kfar Kila. Shortly after, its forces bombed it.
Fears over Hezbollah retaliation, the Israeli media said that Israel’s army requested all residents of the Ma’ayan Baruch settlement in north Israel to stay in shelters.
Sirens were sounded in several towns in the Upper Galilee in northern Israel, Yedioth Ahronoth said.
Israel's military said 18 of its soldiers were injured, one of them seriously, when a drone struck their position in the occupied Golan Heights, which border Lebanon.
The Israeli army said in a statement the strike happened earlier on Sunday. It said since then, it had struck Hezbollah targets in southern Lebanon with air strikes and artillery fire.
Fighting between Israel and Lebanon's Hezbollah has been escalating, after it was triggered by the Gaza war.