Al-Buraq Wall: Targeted historical identity
Al-Buraq Wall is one of the most famous historical landmarks of the occupied city of al-Quds (‘Jerusalem’). It is the wall that borders the Al-Aqsa Mosque from the west, and extends to al-Maghareba Gate to the south.
Al-Buraq Wall is one of the most famous historical landmarks of the occupied city of al-Quds (‘Jerusalem’). It is the wall that borders the Al-Aqsa Mosque from the west, and extends to al-Maghareba Gate to the south.
Religious status
The Wall has a big religious status for Muslims. It is associated with the miracle of the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him), known as Israa & Mi'raj [Prophet's night travel & ascension to heavens]. The name of the wall, Al-Buraq, was after the animal that the Prophet (PBUH) used to ascend to the sky at night from Makkah to Al-Aqsa in Quds.
Since the Islamic conquest, Al-Buraq Wall has remained an Islamic Waqf and a pure right for Muslims. None of its stones date back to King Solomon’s era as the Jews claim.
The Jews call the wall ‘the Wailing Wall’ because their prayers next to it take the form of crying and wailing.
A Muslim Right
Sheikh Ikrima Sabri, the preacher of the Al-Aqsa Mosque and head of the Supreme Islamic Authority in Occupied Quds, told the PIC reporter: “We, Muslims, affirm our right to this wall, which is an integral part of the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque.”
Sabri stressed that there is no room to give up or abandon it.
The people of Quds confirm that the road at the wall is not a public road. It was established only for the local residents in al-Maghareba neighborhood and other Muslims to cross to the Al-Buraq mosque and then to the Al-Aqsa Mosque. The Jews were allowed to pass to the wall at the time as a show of religious tolerance, as stipulated by a decree issued by Ibrahim Pasha, the Egyptian ruler of the area in 1840, and not to perform prayers.
Judaization Attempts
The Jews did not take the Al-Buraq Wall as a place of worship until after the British Balfour Declaration of 1917. This wall was not part of the so-called “Jewish temple”, but it was the Islamic tolerance that enabled Jews to stand before the Wall and cry over the destruction of their alleged temple. As time passed, they claimed that Al-Buraq Wall was part of their alleged temple.
Historical documents prove that Britain, which was the Mandatory colonial power in Palestine, explicitly admitted in its White Paper issued in November 1928 that the Wall and its surrounding area belong to Muslims and it is part of Al-Aqsa Mosque.
During the era of the British Mandate on Palestine, the visits of Jews to the Wall increased, with Muslims feeling the danger, thus resulting in the outbreak of a revolution on 23 August 1929, in which dozens of Muslims as well as a big number of Jews were killed.
Although Jews admitted to the Committee of the League of Nations in 1929 that they do not claim a right of ownership to Al-Buraq Wall, when Israel occupied the Old City in Quds in 1967, it began to falsify the identity of the Wall.
It started by demolishing al-Maghareba neighborhood, adjacent to the western wall of Al-Aqsa Mosque, including monuments, schools, mosques and corners, and then blew up the houses that surrounded the Wall, displacing its people and claiming that the Wall area belonged to the Jews three thousand years ago. Israel seized the keys of al-Maghareba Gate of Al-Aqsa. Therefore, al-Maghareba Gate is the usual entrance used by Israeli settlers to carry out raids into Al-Aqsa Mosque.
Falsification at international forums
According to international law professor Hanna Issa, a Jewish organization prepared a large replica of Al-Buraq Wall, claiming it is the Jewish Wailing Wall, and put it on display at a special museum in Brooklyn in New York City in a ceremony attended by an Israeli minister.
The Israeli El Al airline has pledged to transfer prayer notes or wishes placed in the structure of the wall in Brooklyn, to be placed between the stones of the ‘Wailing Wall’ in occupied Quds to strengthen the alleged connection between the ‘Wailing Wall’ and the so-called Jewish temple.
Issa told the PIC reporter that an organization called Chabad - an ultra-Orthodox Jewish religious movement - and its branch in New York initiated the construction of the replica wall.
Attempts to falsify history are ongoing, as member of the Fatah Central Committee, Jibril Rajoub, made statements recently that aroused Palestinian public furor, saying that Al-Buraq Wall should remain under the sovereignty of Israel.
(Courtesy: PIC)