The recent clashes in East Jerusalem in Al-Aqsa mosque and Damascus gate has received a low-pitched response from the US.
It was early in Ramadan – an Islamic widely honored month in which worshippers fast from dawn to dust- when Israeli authorities broke a cardinal commitment to uphold the freedom to worship, pushing their way into Al Aqsa mosque. The move was meant to terminate the evening prayers, which happened to occur simultaneously with a ceremony commemorating Israel’s Remembrance Day. The latter, which was reportedly attended by top Israeli leaders, was being held at the Western Wall.
The Israeli officials also restricted entrance to the Mosque to a huge number of people who used to break their fast in the mosque courtyard. Prohibitions were also put on Palestinian people from meeting around the Damascus Gate during Ramadan; a practice that worshippers do during Ramadan.
The claim that these actions were made to shield Palestinians from the pandemic disease were debunked. A great part if inhabitants in the region have received vaccines. Unlike inhabitants in Gaza and the West Bank, Israeli officials provided vaccinations to people in east Jerusalem.
Besides, Permission to enter the east Jerusalem was granted to a small number of Palestinians from the rest of the occupied territories, who were all required to have been vaccinated.
Israel deteriorated the condition when it allowed followers and members of far-right Lehava organization to march into Jerusalem’s old city. The group members, who are considered extremist even inside Israel, chanted “death to Arabs” and “Arabs get out.” Israeli police used violence against Palestinians protesting against the move using stun bombs and tear gas.
Israel has lost contact with the Palestinians in East Jerusalem since decades ago. Tel Aviv has made all attempts to cut any contacts between Palestinians in the region and the national leadership in Palestine after the Oslo Accords were signed in 1993.
Israeli officials routinely banned activities hosted by the Palestinian government in Ramallah or resorted to violence against the participants. Meet their fellow Palestinian leaders were mostly apprehended by massive arrests and prison sentences.
Abuses against Palestinian freedom also extends to a number of other issues too. Israel also failed to implement a number of measures decided in the Accords’ five-year transitional deal that affect Jerusalemites. defense and demographic drive to uproot Palestinian inhabitants were kept on by Tel Aviv and no negotiations over the occupied region and its legal ownership were launched.
Reports indicate that Israel means to prevent Jerusalemite Palestinians voting in the Palestinian parliamentary elections on May 22 against the explicit reference in transitional deal about the region’s residents’ right and freedom to vote in elections.
The “only democracy in the Middle East”, as claimed by officials in Israel, shows no respect for the rights of people all faiths to practice their religious rituals in Jerusalem and elsewhere in occupied lands. The measures enrage the inhabitants and encourages them to protest and Israeli security forces use violence in response.
The chain goes on and on for years while global society suffices to only condemning the violence in words that seems to have no sense of what actually occurs on field.
The US government has only released a vague declaration of “concern” about the Jewish extremists’ march through Jerusalem, which has sparked violence. Biden administration also signaled its willingness on the deferment of Palestinian elections due to the dispute over East Jerusalem resident’s right to vote.
Biden administration’s policy proves to contain a double-standard as it opposes far-right populism and voting intimidation at home. Utilizing different values, when it comes to the Palestine-Israel conflict, shows the influence of Zionist lobbies in US Politics, policy-makers, and political system.
Biden’s policies on Israel, so far, has not been such horse of a different color when compared with that of Trump’s. New policy must be reflected in new strategy and fresh practices to fix the past fallacies; Biden has sufficed to words.
