Source: NY Times:
JERUSALEM — Under heavy pressure and the threat of new Israeli-Palestinian strife, Israel announced on Thursday that it would reopen a contested holy site in the Old City of Jerusalem on Friday morning, a day after closing it for the first time in years.
The site, which Jews call the Temple Mount and Muslims the Noble Sanctuary, has become an increasingly combustible flash point in the underlying Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The decision to close the site, a step that a Palestinian spokesman had denounced as “a declaration of war,” came after Israeli forces shot and killed a Palestinian man suspected of involvement in an assassination attempt on a leading agitator for more Jewish access to the site. The closing prevented Muslims from worshiping at Al Aksa mosque, one of the three holiest sites in Islam.
Categories: Asia