More than 2000 extremist settlers stormed the Al-Aqsa compound on Monday. [Getty]
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ignited fury across the region after publishing a video of himself walking through a massive underground tunnel beneath the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in occupied East Jerusalem on Monday.
The tunnel, part of the controversial “City of David” project, stretches from the Palestinian neighbourhood of Silwan to the area directly underneath the mosque.
The project has been widely condemned as an attempt to reshape Jerusalem’s identity through politicised archaeology and illegal settler expansion.
The timing and location of Netanyahu’s appearance were seen as a deliberate provocation. The video was released on the so-called “Jerusalem Day”, the anniversary of Israel’s 1967 occupation of East Jerusalem, a date routinely marked by settler incursions, racist slogans, and violence against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank.
Netanyahu’s video coincided with a cabinet meeting held in Silwan where Netanyahu declared that his government will “preserve a united and complete Jerusalem”.
Far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir led settler incursions into the compound and declared that Jewish prayer was now permitted at the site, violating longstanding arrangements under which non-Muslim prayer is banned.
Ben-Gvir, a key figure in Israel’s extremist governing coalition, also said he would pray that Netanyahu’s pick to head Shin Bet – the messianic major general David Zini – would “pursue our enemies” and “mow [them] down”.
Netanyahu’s statement sparked immediate backlash from across the Arab world. Jordan’s Foreign Ministry condemned the move, reiterating that “East Jerusalem is an occupied city over which Israel has no sovereignty”.
The Palestinian Foreign Ministry warned that the provocation is part of Israel’s broader campaign of “genocide, displacement, Judaization, and annexation”.
A campaign above and below ground
More than 2,090 settlers stormed the mosque compound on Monday under heavy military escort, according to the Islamic Waqf. The raids were accompanied by marches through the Old City, where ultra-nationalists chanted genocidal slogans such as “death to Arabs” and “flatten Gaza”.
Activists and local residents accuse Israel of trying to impose a new reality both above and below ground and altering the city’s demographics and religious character through force, archaeology, and law.
The excavation beneath Al-Aqsa has long drawn warnings from experts and officials that it risks undermining the mosque’s structural integrity and triggering widespread unrest.
