Amman, Oct. 2 (Petra)-- Israeli settlers on Friday stormed the Bab al-Rahma Cemetery, adjacent to the eastern wall of the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound.

According to the Jerusalem Governorate, settlers performed Jewish religious rituals in the morning to mark what is known as the seventh and final day of the Jewish holiday, carrying what they refer to as the "Four Species." The rituals were conducted outside Bab al-Rahma, along the eastern wall of Al-Aqsa and adjacent to Muslim graves, the Palestinian News and Information Agency (WAFA) reported.

The governorate said the rituals are part of repeated actions witnessed in the area recently, as Jewish groups seek to establish the vicinity of Bab al-Rahma as a site for Jewish prayer and religious rituals by organizing recurring gatherings and prayers there and promoting religious and historical narratives about the site’s significance to Jews.

Some of these narratives, it added, go so far as to claim that the site holds greater significance than the Western Wall.

The Jerusalem Governorate warned that the increasingly frequent and organized rituals are part of attempts to create a new reality around Al-Aqsa Mosque and turn the area adjacent to Bab al-Rahma into a permanent site for Jewish religious rituals, which it said undermines the Islamic identity of the site and targets the historical and legal status quo at Al-Aqsa Mosque and its surroundings.

The governorate noted that recent weeks have witnessed intensified desecration of the Bab al-Rahma Cemetery by settlers in what it described as attempts to take control of the cemetery and expand the area in which Jewish religious rituals are performed at Islamic holy sites.

//Petra// MF