The Temple Mount camera fiasco will hurt the Palestinians

Last month, the Jordan Times wrote:

The Israeli occupation authorities and right wing cannot prevent Jordan from installing surveillance cameras in Al Aqsa Mosque/Al Haram Al Sharif compound, Government Spokesperson Mohammad Momani said on Monday.

The goal of installing the cameras is to preserve the identity of Al Aqsa and record any violations by Israeli extremists and the Israeli occupation forces, Momani said.

The Jerusalem Awqaf Department, which is affiliated with the Awqaf Ministry, will be in charge of the cameras through a control room, he noted, stressing the legal, moral and religious importance of this step, aimed at safeguarding holy sites against Israeli acts of aggression.

By installing the cameras, Jordan seeks to document these violations and enable 1.7 billion Muslims to follow what is happening in the courtyards of Al Aqsa Mosque, Islam’s third holiest shrine, on the Internet, Momani said.

Palestinians should love that, right? After all, they said that Jews violating the sanctity of the Al Aqsa Mosque was the entire reason they started stabbing random Jews to begin with - why wouldn't they want documentation of these rampaging Jews?

As Khaled Abu Toameh wrote last November, here's why:

Shortly after Israel accepted the idea, the Palestinian Authority rushed to denounce it as a "new trap." PA Foreign Minister Riad al-Malki and other officials in Ramallah expressed concern that Israel would use the cameras to "arrest Palestinians under the pretext of incitement."

During the past two years, the Palestinian Authority and other parties, including Hamas and the Islamic Movement (Northern Branch) in Israel, have been waging a campaign of incitement against Jewish visits to the Haram al-Sharif. The campaign claimed that Jews were planning to destroy Al-Aqsa Mosque.

In an attempt to prevent Jews from entering the approximately 37-acre (150,000 m2) site, the Palestinian Authority and the Islamic Movement in Israel hired scores of Muslim men and women to harass the Jewish visitors and the police officers escorting them. The men are referred to as Murabitoun, while the women are called Murabitat (defenders or guardians of the faith).

These men and women have since been filmed shouting and trying to assault Jews and policemen at the Haram al-Sharif. This type of video evidence is something that the Palestinian Authority is trying to avoid. The PA, together with the Islamic Movement, wants the men and women to continue harassing the Jews under the pretext of "defending" the Al-Aqsa Mosque from "destruction" and "contamination."

The installation of surveillance cameras at the site will expose the aggressive behavior of the Murabitoun and Murabitat, and show the world who is really "desecrating" the Islamic holy sites and turning them into a base for assaulting and abusing Jewish visitors and policemen.

The cameras are also likely to refute the claim that Jews are "violently invading" Al-Aqsa Mosque and holding prayers at the Temple Mount. The Palestinian Authority, Hamas and the Islamic Movement have long been describing the Jewish visits as a "provocative and violent incursion" into Al-Aqsa Mosque. But now the cameras will show that Jews do not enter Al-Aqsa Mosque, as the Palestinians have been claiming.

Another reason the Palestinians are opposed to King Abdullah's idea is their fear that the cameras would expose that Palestinians have been smuggling stones, firebombs and pipe bombs into Al-Aqsa Mosque for the past two years. These are scenes at the PA, Hamas and the Islamic Movement do not want the world to see: they show who is really "contaminating" the Haram al-Sharif. Needless to say, no Jewish visitors have thus far been caught trying to smuggle such weapons into the holy site.

And he has been proven to be 100% right. Al Monitor reported three weeks ago:

Kamal al-Khatib, deputy head of the Islamic Movement in the 1948 occupied territories, told Al-Monitor, “We do not doubt the Jordanian intentions, but we think that these cameras will help Israel watch believers who deter the settlers’ incursions into Al-Aqsa mosque [compound].”

He added, “Internet networks in Jerusalem are connected to the Israeli communication networks, and Israel’s security system is capable of unlocking the cameras and watching what is on them, thanks to Israel’s advanced techniques. This would allow the latter to observe the defenders and believers at Al-Aqsa.”

Hassan Khater, head of the Jerusalem International Center and former director of the Islamic-Christian Commission For the Support of Jerusalem and Holy Sites, told Al-Monitor that Jerusalem’s Palestinian citizens reject the camera installation because of their bad experiences in the past. “Although the cameras [can be] beneficial, their disadvantages outweigh their advantages, especially in terms of security and pursuit of believers,” he said. The camera installation will have serious repercussions, as it will facilitate Israeli settlers' raids and lead to the pursuit of Al-Aqsa frequenters who try to deter them, he said.

The "defenders and believers" are the Mourabitoun who violently try to prevent Jews from peacefully visiting their holiest site. And cameras would expose what we've known all along.

After all, there are many hours of footage of Jews quietly visiting the Temple Mount taken by Muslims on YouTube. And there are many hours of footage from the same sources showing the Muslims acting aggressively and violently towards the Jews.

Jordan and the other Arab countries heard all the Palestinian propaganda about how Jews are "storming Al Aqsa" and they thought that it was a slam dunk to place cameras on the site to catch the Jews in the act. What they didn't quite realize was that their Palestinian brethren have been lying about this for years, and that they are the ones whose violent actions would have been caught by the cameras.

The entire "knife intifada" was built on a lie and the cameras would have proven that. 

Now the Palestinians have convinced the Jordanians to drop the camera plan, and you just know that the Jordanians are a little less sympathetic towards the Palestinians who have been lying to them so egregiously for so long about one of their central claims.

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