Police Commissioner Lt-Gen Yohanan Danino sad Thursday that the decision to close off the Temple Mount to both Muslims and Jews, for the first time in 15 years, is a temporary one. “We do not intend to make this a permanent status,” he told reporters at Ir David, after touring eastern Jerusalem in the wake of the attempt to murder Temple activist Yehuda Glick. “Right now, we are carrying out a situation assessment, in the coming hours, and on its basis we will determine how to deploy futher on down the line.”
"In routine times, when there is a threat against anyone, and any citizen, there is a very orderly procedure in which we carry out an evaluation of threatened individuals,” he explained.
"Regarding a citizen like Yehuda Glick, who does not bear an official position – he is well known, by the way, for his activities around the Temple Mount, and recently he also received a distancing order from the Temple Mount – of course, if there are specific threats we update [the person threatened] and we take action of necessary.”
"There was no specific threat that reached us that required some kind of action or another,” Danino insisted, ignoring reports that indicate Glick was specifically marked as a target by Islamist sites, and that Glick filed five complaints about threats against him until police inaction made him give up on this route of action.
The commissioner promised that the police would carry out an in-depth inquiry regarding the attempted murder Wednesday night, including the fact that the terrorist had been employed at the Begin Center, where the attack took place and where numerous nationalist events are held, often with the participation of top government officials.
"In any case, let me repeat – this is a sensitive time,” he added. “The goal we all share is calming down the situation on the ground. [Police] presence and conspicuousness have a calming effect.”
"We will calm down matters and bring the Temple Mount back to routine,” he vowed. “We will return to the routine of life in Jerusalem. That is what we all seek. I ask everyone, without any exceptions, from all the leadership, the politicians... This is not the time to make declarations.”