Like a bridge over troubled waters

February 8, 2007 - 6:35 PM by Sarah

Izzy Bee and the (unfortunately nicknamed) SnoopyTheGoon weigh in on the brouhaha surrounding Israel’s attempts to renovate the platform to the Mugrabi gate.

Exerpt from Izzy:

The plan to refurbish this sensitive place in the Old City has predictably affronted Muslims, who accuse Israelis of defiling their holy places or even plotting to destroy them to make way for a third Temple and bring on Armageddon.

. . . . Izzy hopes that the outcry from the Arab street to desist won’t make Israeli officials all the more stubborn and maybe spark off a new Intifada. (Though some analysts say that Palestinians will grasp at any excuse to resurrect this ugly option.)

From Snoopy:

The waves of hysteria about the newly generated myth about “Israeli Designs on Al-Aqsa” are getting higher and higher by the day. Just to watch the language used by various Muslim sources is highly educational, seeing a new low in the anti-Israeli propaganda. So:

* Israeli designs on Al-Aqsa (Al Jazeera)
* Attempts to “obliterate” the Islamic stamp of Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa Mosque (Al Jazeera)
* Ethnic cleansing operation (Al Jazeera)
* Israel’s intentions to destroy holy Islamic sites (Abu Mazen via Haaretz)
* What Israel is doing in its practices and attacks against our sacred Muslim sites in Jerusalem and al-Aqsa is a blatant violation (King Abdullah II via Haaretz)

. . . .But what is really going on?

The dig is part of a plan to rebuild the Mugrabi bridge walkway planned to run from the Dung gate to the Mugrabi gate, which serves as the primary entrance to the compound referred to by Jews as the Temple Mount and Muslims as al-Haram al-Sherif, the Noble Sanctuary.

. . . It is easy to see that the location of the bridge is a) outside the Temple Mount and b) quite far away from the Al-Aqsa mosque. To get a better visual impression, here is a snapshot of the area (the Mugrabi bridge is marked by the red line):