So far this year, 20,000 Jewish visitors have ascended to the Temple Mount.
The record has been 20,060 Jewish visitors ascending to the Temple Mount within one year, and that was set during the first year of the liberation of the sacred site from Jordanian occupation.
Last month saw more Jewish Israelis visit the Temple Mount in one month – approximately 3,200 – than in any other month since 1967.
Jordan’s Foreign Affairs Minister Ayman Safadi described the visits to the Temple Mount by Israeli Jews as “extremists who stormed Al Aqsa” in his speech last month to Muslim nations in Istanbul.
Israel has diplomatic ties with both Jordan and Turkey, but lawmakers in both nations have actively incited Muslims against Israel.
Safadi warned at the gathering of Islamic nations that many more “crises” can be expected “as a result of continued Israeli violations … if the occupation doesn’t end, if east Jerusalem is not independent and not the capital of the sovereign Palestinian state along the 1967 lines.”
The U.S. delegation to the Middle East is scheduled to arrive in the final week of August as part of its continuing effort to reboot the peace process between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. The delegation is also scheduled to meet with Jordan, as well as with Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates.
