The Palestinian Authority’s foreign affairs bureau on Thursday condemned what it described as the "racist" statements of National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, who "boasts of his repeated calls to colonialists to increase their incursions into the Al-Aqsa Mosque."
Minister Ben Gvir is set to meet in the coming days with activists organizing visits to the Temple Mount, as part of his policy allowing freedom of worship for Jews throughout the Temple Mount.
Sources close to Ben Gvir stressed that "there is no law permitting racial discrimination against Jews on the Temple Mount or anywhere else in Israel."
In a statement issued on Thursday, the PA foreign affairs bureau claimed that Ben Gvir’s remarks provide further proof of the danger posed by Israel’s plans to "Judaize occupied Jerusalem and annex territories to Israel."
The PA bureau further claimed Israel is working to change the legal and historical status of Jerusalem, isolate the city from its Palestinian Arab surroundings, and impose a division of the site’s use based on time and place, as a step toward demolishing the Al-Aqsa Mosque and building the Temple in its place.
It called on the international community and the UN Security Council to take practical steps to protect Jerusalem and its holy sites.