This article is from the source 'nytimes' and was first published or seen on . It last changed over 40 days ago and won't be checked again for changes.

You can find the current article at its original source at http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/30/world/middleeast/right-wing-israeli-activist-shot-jerusalem.html

The article has changed 4 times. There is an RSS feed of changes available.

Version 1 Version 2
Right-Wing Israeli Activist Is Shot and Wounded in Jerusalem Activist in Israel Is Wounded in Shooting
(about 3 hours later)
JERUSALEM — A prominent Israeli activist who advocates more Jewish access and rights at a hotly contested Jerusalem holy site was shot and seriously wounded by an unknown assailant on Wednesday night, according to the police, amid spiraling tensions and conflict over religious claims to the site. JERUSALEM — An Israeli-American agitator who has pushed for more Jewish access and rights at a hotly contested religious site in Jerusalem was shot and seriously wounded Wednesday night by an unidentified assailant in an apparent assassination attempt.
Micky Rosenfeld, a spokesman for the police, said that a man in his 50s had been shot by an assailant who escaped on a motorcycle and that the police were looking into the background of the event, including the possibility that it was an assassination attempt carried out by a Palestinian. The shooting of the activist, Yehuda Glick, compounded fears of further violence in the increasingly polarized holy city, where tensions are already high over fears of a new Palestinian uprising against Israeli occupation.
The victim was identified as Yehuda Glick, a prominent American-born leader of the Temple Mount Heritage Foundation, a rightist group pushing for more Jewish access to Temple Mount, the sacred plateau revered by Jews as the site of ancient Jewish temples and by Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary, the location of Al Aksa mosque, the third-holiest site in Islam. The compound is in the Old City of Jerusalem in territory that Israel seized from Jordan in the 1967 war and then annexed in a move that was never internationally recognized. Reports that Mr. Glick had been shot came as the United Nations Security Council convened in an emergency session, at the request of Palestinian and Jordanian diplomats, to address the religious strife and growing anger over Israeli housing expansions in East Jerusalem, which the Palestinians regard as the capital of a future state.
Tensions over the site, which is administered by the Muslim authorities, have sharply risen in recent months, with Muslim worshipers and protesters frequently clashing with the police. Israel, which regards all of Jerusalem as its capital, has faced intense criticism over the housing expansions, including from its most important ally, the United States, which has described them as illegitimate obstructions to an any hope for a peaceful solution to the longstanding Palestinian-Israeli conflict.
Palestinian leaders have decried the increasing Jewish presence on the mount, as Jewish activists have made a point of visiting more frequently. Under the status quo, Jews are allowed to visit the compound but not to pray there. President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority recently called on Palestinians to defend Jerusalem and the Muslim holy sites there “by all means.” Micky Rosenfeld, a spokesman for the police, said Mr. Glick had been wounded by an assailant who escaped on a motorcycle. He said the police were examining the possibility that the assailant was a Palestinian assassin.
The shooting took place outside the Menachem Begin Heritage Center in a predominantly Jewish area of central Jerusalem. Mr. Glick, widely viewed as a provocative figure who has exacerbated tensions between Muslims and Jews, is an American-born leader of groups pushing for more Jewish access to the Temple Mount, the sacred plateau revered by Jews as the site of ancient Jewish temples and by Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary, the location of Al Aksa Mosque, the third holiest site in Islam.
The compound is in the Old City of Jerusalem in territory that Israel seized from Jordan in the 1967 war and then annexed in a move that was never internationally recognized.
Tensions over the site, which is administered by the Muslim authorities, have sharply risen in recent months, with Muslim worshipers and protesters clashing with the police and accusing them of restricting access. On Sunday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel ordered an increase in the Jerusalem police force to quell the violence.
Palestinian leaders have decried the increasing Jewish presence on the mount, as Jewish activists have made a point of visiting more frequently.
Under the status quo, Jews are allowed to visit the compound but not to pray there. President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority has called on Palestinians to defend Jerusalem and the Muslim holy sites there “by all means.” Mr. Netanyahu, who has vowed to maintain the status quo, has accused Mr. Abbas of escalating tensions with such statements, an assertion Mr. Abbas has called “baseless.”
“The solution is to remove the causes for this tension, primarily the presence of the settlements in Jerusalem which serve as provocation to the local residents, and second, to stop the prevention of prayers,” Mr. Abbas said Wednesday in an interview broadcast on Israel’s Channel 10.
The shooting of Mr. Glick took place outside the Menachem Begin Heritage Center in a predominantly Jewish area of central Jerusalem. Mr. Glick and his supporters had been attending a Temple Mount convention there.
Tall, redheaded and bearded, Mr. Glick is an easily recognizable figure. Footage from Wednesday night’s convention broadcast on Israeli television showed Mr. Glick addressing the audience and warning that those who “stand up” for more Jewish rights on Temple Mount are likely to be denounced by opponents as “right-wing extremists,” “dangerous” and “delusional.”
 Peeking at his cellphone while on the podium Mr. Glick joked that he kept it on just in case permission came through to rebuild the Jewish temple at the ancient site, in which case, he said, he would have to leave.
 Mr. Glick has described himself in interviews as a licensed tour guide who makes a living by taking groups on tours of Temple Mount. The police have banned him several times from the site, a measure that Mr. Glick has challenged in the Israeli courts.
At the Jerusalem hospital where Mr. Glick underwent surgery, his father, Shimon Glick, told reporters his son had received numerous death threats but that the police had given him no protection. At the Security Council, Jeffrey Feltman, the under secretary-general for political affairs, said rising Israeli-Palestinian tensions, coming even as the recovery effort from the 50-day Gaza war this summer had barely started, were ominous. Instead of moving toward the goal of a two-state solution to the conflict, he said, Israelis and Palestinians were “moving the situation ever closer to a one-state reality.”
There was no hint of conciliatory talk by either the Palestinian or Israeli speakers, however, with both appearing to harden their long-held differences. The Palestinian ambassador, Riyad Mansour, said Israel, as the occupying power, was “further inflaming this volatile situation, and threatening to ignite yet another cycle of violence.” The Israeli ambassador, Ron Prosor, asserting what he called Israel’s unassailable claim to all of Jerusalem dating to biblical times, accused the Palestinians of incitement, “outright lies and half-truths about Israel.”