The last time the Israeli flag flew on the Temple Mount was for a very brief time after the IDF liberated the site in the 1967 Six Day War, but on Wednesday, a group of Chinese Christian tourists posed with a flag on the steps leading up to the Dome of the Rock.
On Wednesday, Stand With Us, a non-profit pro-Israel education and advocacy organization based in Los Angeles posted the photo on their Facebook page, saying:
Yosef Rabin writes, “An Israeli Flag has not flown on the Temple Mount since the 1967 War. Today Chinese tourists brought an Israeli Flag up to the Temple Mount. I am not sure how they got the flag past security and how the Waqf [Jordanian Islamic security that controls the Temple Mount] or police did not notice, but this sets a massive precedent – I hope.
In the meantime, A BIG THUMBS UP FOR THE CHINESE!!!”
Despite the best efforts of Rabin, the group of Chinese tourists could not be contacted and nothing more could be discovered about them. It can be assumed that they were not Jewish since Jews who ascend to the Temple Mount are rigorously searched beforehand and accompanied by both Israeli police and Waqf guards to ensure that such displays of Israeli nationalism are prevented from appearing on the site.
When Israel liberated the Temple Mount in the 1967 Six Day War, Motta Gur, the Israeli general who led the troops into Jerusalem, ordered an Israeli flag to be raised atop the golden Dome of the Rock. Defense Minister Moshe Dayan saw this from his post on Mount Scopus and ordered the flag to be lowered.
According to the ceasefire agreed upon formal peace agreement signed between Israel and Jordan after the war, no Jewish religious items or Israeli symbols were permitted at the site. This agreement was formalized in the peace agreement signed in 1994 ceding custodianship of the Temple Mount and Muslim holy sites in Jerusalem to the Hashemite Kingdom.
There is currently an ongoing petition by World Likud, a global extension of the Likud political party in Israel, and the French Zionist organization, Israël is Forever , requesting the right to fly the Israeli flag on the Temple Mount.
