A Jewish man who visited the Temple Mount was attacked multiple times by Muslim children screaming “Allahu Akbar,” and, he says, a police officer who was present did nothing to stop the attacks.
Temple Mount activist Yehuda Glick recalled the attacks in an interview with Arutz Sheva.
Hearing calls of “Allahu Akbar” (Arabic for “G-d is great”) is something he has grown used to, Glick says. “All I can say is ‘Amen,’ because G-d really is great,” he told Arutz Sheva radio.
But on one of his latest visits, he said, the attempts to insult him escalated into physical attack. He was accompanied by a police officer, as is standard procedure for Jews visiting the Temple Mount. The officer was ostensibly there for his protection – but, he said, as events unfolded it became clear that protection was not his true purpose.
Glick first came under attack at the southeast corner of the Temple Mount, near a memorial put up to “Crimes of Zionism in Sabra and Shatila” – a reference to mass slayings of Muslims in Lebanon at the hands of a Christian militia that was working with IDF troops.
Two Arab teenagers, approximately age 16-17, began hurling stones at Glick, who turned to his accompanying officer and asked him to arrest them. “He told me, ‘That’s not my job. My job is just to escort you, not to chase after rock throwers.’”
Glick noted that the officer told him that he knew who the attackers were “and will make sure it is taken care of.”
Later, they saw the same two young men again. “I told him, ‘Arrest them,’ and he repeated that that’s not his job,” Glick recalled.
The story did not end there. Glick continued on, only to come under attack a second time. This time the attack came from a group of Muslim boys who he estimated were just ten years old. The children began to scream “Allahu Akbar” and to throw rocks at Glick and the officer.
“I told the officer that this is too much already. It’s outrageous,” he said. He also turned to a nearby Muslim man from the Waqf, the Muslim organization that controls the site. “I told him, ‘I’m embarrassed for you. If my son would act this way at a holy site, I would deal with it,’” he said.
Perhaps surprisingly, the Muslim man agreed. “He told me, ‘Between you and me, you’re right,’” Glick said.
The police officer’s inaction in the face of a second attack led Glick to take action. He called the Police Commander for Holy Places, Avi Biton, and told him what was happening. Biton said that what Glick described was serious, and that police would look into it.
When his accompanying officer saw what he was doing, he furiously shouted, “You’re creating a disturbance. Get out!” – not at the rioters, but at Glick, Glick said.
Only a massive Jewish presence on the Temple Mount can prevent such attacks, he concluded. Police officers believe it is there job to keep things quiet, he said, and when thousands of Arabs and only a few Jews visit the site, the Jews are seen as the anomaly that is causing the disturbance.