Israeli security forces walk past Muslim worshippers gathering outside the Jerusalem old city walls on Friday to attend the early morning prayers for Eid al-Fitr, marking the end of the holy month of Ramadan. Holy sites such as the Aqsa Mosque compound in Jerusalem's old city have remained closed for security reasons since the outbreak of the US-Israeli war on Iran. AFP
"Today, Al-Aqsa has been taken from us. It's a sad and painful Ramadan," Wajdi Mohammed Shweiki, a silver-haired Palestinian man in his 60s, told AFP.
"It's a catastrophic situation for the inhabitants of Jerusalem, for Palestinians in general and for all Muslims across the globe."
Since Israel and the United States started the war on Iran on February 28, Israeli authorities have closed access to Jerusalem's world-renowned holy sites over security concerns -- Al-Aqsa Mosque for Muslims and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre for Christians.
As Iranian missile barrages head towards Israel, the authorities have banned gatherings of more than 50 people nationwide to limit potential casualties.
Researchers say this is the first time the Al-Aqsa Mosque -- the third holiest site in Islam -- has been closed during the last 10 days of Ramadan and for Eid al-Fitr since the start of the Israeli occupation in 1967.
As the holiday marked the end of the Muslim holy month, worshippers denied access to the site arrived with prayer mats under their arms at dawn under the watchful supervision of Israeli occupation forces.
Shouting "Allahu akbar" ("God is the greatest") or chanting the shahada (the Muslim declaration of faith), the crowd tried to push through the city gates.
But the few dozen occupation officers repelled them, occasionally with kicks or slaps to the head and at least twice with tear gas.
Eventually, the worshippers managed to take up a position next to Bab az-Zahra as the police relented for a few minutes and allowed the street prayers to take place.
An imam standing on a plastic stool delivered a short sermon.
"Pray, invoke Almighty God and hope that your prayers will be answered," he told the worshippers. "O God, grant victory to the oppressed."
The Israeli occupation forces then pushed back the worshippers, who dispersed without resistance into the narrow streets, buying still-warm bread from street stalls as they went.
'Broken heart'
The gathering of just a few hundred worshippers was a far cry from the typical way Eid is usually marked in Jerusalem, when some 100,000 people flock to Al-Aqsa.
The Israeli occupation forces said that "despite the high-alert status, police allowed prayers to be conducted on the street outside the Old City of Jerusalem without intervention".
"The occupier, under the pretext of security and for its own interests, has closed the mosque," cleric Ayman Abu Najm, who had come from Beit Hanina, a Palestinian neighbourhood in east Jerusalem, said.
"In the history of the occupation, this is the longest period during which the Al-Aqsa Mosque has been closed."
"Ramadan without the Al-Aqsa Mosque is a very sad feeling, a feeling of having a broken heart," said worshipper Zeyad Mona.
Short link: