Israeli police have invaded the al-Aqsa mosque for the second time in recent weeks, which has prompted clashes with Arab worshippers, Israeli and Palestinian officials have said.
Hundreds of Israeli forces have been deployed to seal off the compound confining hundreds of worshippers inside the holy mosque.
Israeli Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said 12 arrests were made in and around the compound.
Reports say police threw stun grenades and canisters at worshippers, injuring at least fifteen Palestinians.
Rosenfeld however claimed that Arab youth prompted the clashes after throwing stones and a petrol bomb at Israeli police.
Over the past month, tensions have been high and the compound has been the scene of fighting after Israeli extremist tried to enter the mosque and clashed with Palestinian worshipers.
Israeli police denied Palestinian access to the mosque compound for several days.
Meanwhile, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has openly voiced the Israeli government’s plans to expel indigenous Palestinian Arabs from their occupied lands.
Netanyahu stressed that Palestinians should recognize Israel as a Jewish state in order to end their conflict.
“That’s right,” Netanyahu told The Washington Post when asked if such recognition was needed.
“Israel is not a bi-national state,” AFP quoted Netanyahu as saying on Saturday. “It has non-Jews who live here with full, equal rights, but it has two things that assure its special character.”
“It’s the homeland of any Jew. And there is a very broad consensus in Israel that the Palestinian refugee problem should be resolved outside Israel’s borders,” he added.
Netanyahu said Palestinians will have to make a final peace deal with “the Jewish state of Israel.”
“Jews come here and Palestinians will go there. So choose. That’s the basis of a solution,” Netanyahu concluded.
