In a statement marking the 49th anniversary of an arson attack by a Christian Australian tourist on the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem, Hamas stresses that the heart of the conflict with Israel is "the liberation of the land of Palestine and the holy sites of Islam and Christianity, chief among them the city of Al-Quds [Arabic for Jerusalem, based on the Hebrew word for "holy" -ed] and the Al-Aqsa Mosque."