The Israeli occupation police prevented more than 2,000 Palestinians from entering the Ibrahimi Mosque in the city of Hebron on Thursday where they were hoping to take part in a celebration of the birthday of Prophet Muhammad, Anadolu has reported.
The director of the Ibrahimi Mosque, Hefzi Abu Sneina, told the news agency that the Israeli authorities allowed only 500 Palestinians to enter and prevented over 2,000 others from going in. He described this as a “serious violation” of the right to worship freely.
“Today the mosque is fully open to Muslims, but the [Israeli] occupation, as usual, is diminishing and violating Palestinian rights,” he added.
In 1994, Israel divided the mosque between Muslims and Jews after a Jewish extremist settler, Baruch Goldstein, massacred 29 Palestinian worshippers and wounded many more while they were praying in the mosque. The mosque is named after Prophet Ibrahim (Abraham), who is buried there.