Occupation forces assault protesters demonstrating against Israeli president’s planned visit to Al-Khalil

Yesterday, Palestinian officials described Herzog’s planned visit as a provocation and a flagrant violation of the sanctity of the site, and that the Israeli occupation will bear full responsibility for the repercussions of this attack on the site.

Several Israeli left-wing groups also lambasted the Zionist regime's president’s planned visit to the Ibrahimi Mosque and urged protests against it.

The Israeli troops manning the checkpoints at the roads leading to the holy site assaulted the protesters who waved Palestinian flags and shouted slogans that expressed their rejection of the provocative visit.

After the 1994 massacre of 29 Palestinian worshippers inside the mosque by a Jewish extremist settler, Baruch Goldstein, the Israeli occupation authorities divided the mosque complex between Muslims and Jewish settlers.

The city of Al-Khalil, which houses the Ibrahimi Mosque, is home to roughly 160,000 Palestinian Muslims and about 800 notoriously aggressive Israeli settlers who live in compounds heavily guarded by Israeli troops.

In early 2019, Israel expelled the only international observers protecting Hebron’s (Al-Khalil) Palestinians from 800 heavily guarded settlers, one of whom committed the 1994 massacre that triggered their deployment.