Jerusalem – Muharram 04, 1429/ January 13, 2008 – A UNESCO-sponsored conference is scheduled to begin here today for evaluation of an Israeli plan to build a bridge leading to Al-Magharebah gate near Al Aqsa Mosque. Jordanian experts are taking part in the meeting, according to Jordanian Minister of Information Affairs and Communication Nasser Judeh. “Jordan’s participation in the meeting has the aim of reasserting the country’s attitude that considers Al-Magharebah gate an integral part of Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, an area which is under the exclusive responsibility of the Jordanian Religious Endowments Department,” Judeh said.
Israel captured East Jerusalem from Jordan in the 1967 six-day war along with the rest of the West Bank. However, under the peace treaty, which Jordan concluded with Israel in 1994, the Jewish state acknowledged the Hashemite Kingdom’s right to look after the Islamic and Christian holy shrines in East Jerusalem. Jordan has repeatedly considered Israeli excavations near Al-Aqsa Mosque as violations of the relevant UN Security Council resolutions.
Meanwhile, the Islamic Action Front (IAF), Jordan’s biggest political party, yesterday urged the government to unequivocally reject US President George W Bush’s remarks asserting Israel as a Jewish state. “We are awaiting a clear Jordanian official attitude that rejects Israel as a Jewish state and sticks to the Palestinian people’s right to an independent and a fully sovereign state as well as to the right of refugees” to return to their homes, the IAF official spokesman Rhayyel Gharaibeh said in a statement.
During his visit to Israel and the Palestinian territories earlier this week, Bush advocated Israel as homeland for the Jewish people, a remark virtually excluding the return of Palestinian refugees to their homes they were forced to quit upon Israel’s foundation in 1948. The UN General Assembly’s resolution 194 provided for the return of Palestinians to their homes or compensating those who choose not to return. “Bush’s hostile statement represents one of the stages of the liquidation of the Palestinian question, the offshoots of which will affect the rights of the Palestinian and Jordanian peoples as well as neighboring Arab countries,” Gharaibeh said adding “the recognition of the Jewish nature of Israel heralds a new aggression as well as a new chapter of the conspiracy against Arab rights.”
IINA                                                                                                                     Jan. 13, 2008

Source: http://www.islamicnews.org.sa/en/1.php

Posted by: Sofian Abdelaziz Zakkout, info@al-amana.org