The Temple Mount Status Quo: Stability in a Sea of Regional Radicalism

The status of the Temple Mount and the al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem has become a destabilizing issue in Israel and the Middle East. The demand for the “liberation” of al-Aqsa has become the battle cry for extremists including Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Iran, and Turkey. Al-Aqsa’s “occupation” provided Hamas with a pretext to launch its terror campaigns against Israel.

Hamas branded its October 7, 2023, massacre the “al-Aqsa Flood,” reminiscent of the PLO’s “al-Aqsa Intifada” of 2000 to 2004. The term was then coined by PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat, to compete with Hamas for popularity on the Palestinian street. This strategy of invoking the “al-Aqsa is in danger” libel hearkens back to the first Palestinian Arab “Grand Mufti” Haj Amin al-Husseini who branded the slander to trigger violence against Jews in the 1920s and 1930s after they attempted to pray at the Western Wall.¹

Just as the al-Aqsa issue can be a “volcano” that erupts violently and generates instability, maintaining the status quo on the Temple Mount that originated in 1967, as determined by Israel and the Jordanian Waqf [religious foundation and endowment] after the Six-Day War, could serve as an anchor of security and stability to Jerusalem, Israel, and the region at large.

What Was the “Status Quo?”

What was the original 1967 status quo between Israel and the Jordanian Waqf? The oral agreement between former Minister of Defense Moshe Dayan and the Waqf stipulated that the Temple Mount and the Muslim holy shrines there “belong to Islam” and would be administered by the Waqf. This specified that Jews could visit the Mount, but not worship in organized prayer. Israel’s security forces would guard the Mount.²

The 1967 status quo agreement formed the basis of the 1994 Israel-Jordan peace treaty. The agreement clarified Jordan’s special role as the custodians of Haram al-Sharif (the Temple Mount). Since 1967, four more mosques were established on the Mount: the el-Marwani Mosque, underground, in Solomon’s Stables;³ the “Ancient Al-Aqsa” Mosque, established in 1998 under the existing upper mosque; and the once open-space Gate of Mercy (Golden Gate) prayer area, converted into a mosque in 2019. For political reasons, Palestinians began referring to the entire Temple Mount as “Al Aqsa,” instead of its traditional Arabic name, “al-Haram al-Sharif” (the Holy and Noble Place).⁴

While the Waqf expanded its hold on the Temple Mount, Jews were more limited in their access to it. In the first decade after the Six-Day War, Jews were allowed to enter through the Chain Gate and the Cotton Merchants’ Gate, but then they were restricted to entering through the Mughrabi Gate. Since then, Jews have only been allowed to visit during limited hours, under police permission and surveillance, to pray in a “non-demonstrative” manner on the Temple Mount’s eastern flank.⁵

These limitations reflect Islam’s historical, sweeping prohibitions on non-Muslims ascending the Temple Mount, laid down by the Mamluks in the thirteenth century⁶ after liberating Jerusalem from the Crusaders, who had desecrated Islamic sanctuaries. The original prohibition was directed at Christians and included Jews.

After assimilating the lessons of the failed revolt against the Romans, Judaism itself instituted a sweeping halakhic [religious] ban on ascending the Mount as an act that could spark the hostility of the world’s nations.

Although the Western Wall courtyard was controlled by the Waqf during Ottoman times, the sultan allowed Jews to pray there with a special firman (written permission granted by an Islamic government official).⁷ The Ottoman system was built on religious autonomy and tolerance.

The status quo established after the Six-Day War created a historical precedent in which a central Muslim authority—the Waqf administration of the mosque compound – agreed that a Jewish force – the State of Israel – would guard Islamic sanctuaries. In turn, the Waqf relinquished its claim to the Western Wall courtyard which was then expanded to a plaza.

The Waqf administration, under the rubric of Jordan’s Ministry of Endowments, provided a stabilizing component to the overall political “powder keg” that Jerusalem represented. The extension of the 1967 status quo on the Temple Mount/Haram al-Sharif exemplified Israeli-Jordanian cooperation. However, over time, this cooperation has become strained.

Israel and Jordan have traded accusations of violations of the sensitive status quo. Israel blamed Jordan for inciting tensions among Palestinians in east Jerusalem and across the West Bank and Gaza by claiming that Israel violates the status quo. Jordan has criticized Israel for allowing Jewish prayers on the Temple Mount. The Palestinian Authority media and social networks consistently accuse Israel’s “violent settlers” of “storming” the al Aqsa mosque.

In November 2014, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry assessed the Jordanian claims, and after a meeting with Jordan’s King Abdullah and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, he wrote a memorandum expressing the status quo, as described above.⁸ Yet, tensions between Israel and Jordan have only intensified.

Instead of the status quo arrangements laying the foundation for cooperation, they increasingly became a contentious issue in Israel’s relations with Jordan, negatively impacting security cooperation along the Israeli-Jordanian border. The undermining of the Temple Mount status quo has, surprisingly, stirred strong anti-Israeli sentiments among the Bedouin tribes in Jordan who guard the Jordan-Israel border and has brought them into a dangerous alliance with the Muslim Brotherhood.

This is particularly relevant after Iran’s moves to weaken Jordan and smuggle weapons and ammunition across Israel’s borders into Palestinian cities in the West Bank. Today, Iranian-backed incitement and violence are evident on both sides of the Jordan River. Moreover, in the event of instability in Hashemite Jordan, Israel might be forced to contend with missiles launched from Jordan. Jordan’s security cooperation with Israel on April 14, 2024, in eliminating Iranian drones and missiles fired by Iran should not be taken for granted.

There is an additional underemphasized point in the discussion over the ongoing status quo: The tacit, yet determined, competition between Jordan and Saudi Arabia over the title of “Guardian of the Holy Places” – the Muslim shrines on the Temple Mount. The Hashemite dynasty once held this title over the holy city of Mecca until it was replaced by the Saudis in 1923. Yet, in 1948, Amman regained sovereignty over the Old City and within it the al-Aqsa Mosque. Jordan retained custodianship of the mosque in 1967, despite losing the Six-Day War.⁹

However, if the Hashemites lose their custodianship of al-Aqsa, it would threaten the legitimacy of the Hashemite monarchy in Jordan. The Saudis view their prospective control of the Muslim shrines in Jerusalem as legitimizing and empowering their traditional custodianship over Mecca and Medina.

This Saudi-Jordanian tension was further increased when President Trump proposed his “deal of the century” for the Middle East in 2020. The Trump proposal for the Temple Mount included a “Trust Council” (Majlis Visaya) comprised of Muslim powers opposed to the Muslim Brotherhood, to which Jordan would hand over the administration of the mosques.

Trump’s Trust Council proposed including Sunni powers such as Saudi Arabia, the Gulf states, Egypt, Morocco, and Indonesia, with Jordan as a partner, but not as the exclusive custodian. The Trump plan was intended to preclude the Muslim Brotherhood-associated states, led by Turkey and Qatar, from asserting control on the Temple Mount and destabilizing the area.

When the Trump deal stalled, Jordan breathed a sigh of relief. However, new dangers have emerged that compel Jordan and Saudi Arabia to cooperate. Iran now seeks to overthrow the Hashemite monarchy and gain access to the border with Israel—and Saudi Arabia. The two rival monarchies now need to settle their differences over the Temple Mount so they can close ranks against the Iranian—and the Turkish—threats.

The plan also failed to prevent another ongoing threat, Hizb ut-Tahrir, the Islamic Liberation Party (ILP) founded in Jordan-controlled Jerusalem in 1953. The ILP is a crossbreed of the Muslim Brotherhood and the Islamic State. It preaches jihad, but only after the legitimate Muslim caliphate is established.¹⁰

Wither the Status Quo?

Where does this leave the critical status quo issue? Under the current political complexities and realities, that could foretell a massive explosion of violence across the Arab and Muslim world, the best solution is to leave Israel in charge of Temple Mount security. Perhaps counterintuitively, the Arab and Muslim world prefers Israel to be the protector of the Temple Mount/al-Aqsa Mosque compound without publicly declaring it.

However, if the status quo on the Temple Mount collapses, the issue of Jerusalem’s holy site could then be brought to the United Nations Security Council, possibly resulting in an international force that would replace Israel. UNESCO resolutions on the Western Wall Plaza could be the harbinger of noxious Security Council resolutions, further destabilizing an already unstable state of affairs.

Israel and Jordan must work closely to maintain the delicate balancing act of cooperation that the Iranian regime, its terror proxies, and Turkey are working to undermine.

* * *

Photos curated by Lenny Ben-David

* * *

Notes

{Reposted from JCPA}