Knesset member Ariel Kellner and the “Beyadenu” organization are promoting a comprehensive and first-of-its-kind bill to protect the Temple Mount complex. According to the bill, the Temple Mount complex will be protected from desecration, damage due to excavations, and works that may damage or harm the complex and its historical remains.
The bill also states that whoever desecrates the Temple Mount complex or damages the antiquities inside the complex inadvertently or on purpose, who does something that may desecrate the Temple Mount complex, or carries out excavations inside the Temple Mount without the permission of the Antiquities Authority, shall be sentenced to imprisonment of between three and ten years, according to the severity of his actions, along with a fine.
MK Kellner quoted the words of Yigal Alon, according to which “a nation that does not know its past, its present is poor and its future is clouded” and added that “what was clear to our ancestors for 2000 years and was clear to the founders of Zionism and the state, our enemies understand this clearly and use it against us.”
“They understand that the struggle for our physical displacement goes through the displacement of the indisputable connection to the land. The Temple Mount, being the holiest place for the Jewish people, is a central goal for the displacement of the Jewish identity through the destruction of antiquity and the proven connection of the Jewish people to the place.”
“The bill comes to give special weight to the damage to the antiquities in the holy place, which are part of the enemy’s war to uproot us from our land. Let us return to Zion to renew our days as before out of a commitment to our ancient heritage. We must preserve it at all costs.”
Tom Nisani, CEO of Beyadenu, said: “I thank MK Kellner for promoting the law and believe that with God’s help, we will be able to pass it in the winter Knesset session. The Temple Mount complex is created and damaged daily by excavation, unauthorized construction, and vandalism. The purpose of this law is to protect the most significant heritage site of the Jewish people for generations.”
The destruction of the Temple Mount and its antiquities have been documented throughout the years. Last year, the Knesset’s Research and Information Center reported that Islamic authorities clandestinely removed 400 truckloads of dirt from a pit in 1999, ostensibly to create an emergency opening for an underground mosque. Archaeologists continue to sift through the excavated dirt even now. Many other damages, such as digging a deep electrical trench at the temple site in 2007, have occurred without prompting any ministerial committee meeting.
The Committee for the Prevention of Destruction of Antiquities on the Temple Mount by archaeologists Eilat Mazar of Hebrew University, Gabriel Barkay, and other prominent individuals. The committee has alleged that the Jerusalem Waqf attempted to remove archaeological evidence that a Jewish temple ever stood at the Temple Mount by opening a mosque at Solomon’s Stables in 1999. To monitor the Waqf’s construction at the site in the early 2000s, the committee hired aircraft to take aerial photos and monitor the construction progress. The committee filed a petition to the Israel Supreme Court in 2004 to prevent the Israeli government and Jerusalem Waqf from removing 3,000 tons of dirt from the Temple Mount site. Justice Jacob Turkel granted the group’s petition. In 2005, the group publicly criticized the Israeli government for not stopping Waqf construction on the Temple Mount.
