c. 2000 Religion News Service

JERUSALEM _ Outside of Jerusalem’s Old City walls, a group of Palestinian youths denied entrance to the site sat in noontime prayers on the grass and concrete, listening to a sermon that stated, “The Jews are our enemies, and we will beat them.”

Meanwhile, at the Western Wall on the eve of the Jewish pilgrimage holiday of Sukkot, when Jews from around Israel typically stream to the city’s Jewish sites, just one lone group of right-wing religious Jewish youths danced in a circle shouting “The Temple Mount is ours; it belongs to the Jews.”

As the riots enter their third week, holy sites have become an integral part of the battlefield, in a region where religion is a force driving nationalist hatreds, rather than sentiments of tolerance or understanding.

“Holy space here is exploited in terms of political interests,” says Rabbi David Rosen, an Orthodox leader of inter-religious dialogue. “Spiritual attachment becomes a means of staking your claim.”

For both Jews and Arabs, that has certainly been the case at the Al Aksa mosque and Western Wall sites, ever since the first Arab disturbances were triggered by a visit to the mosque compound by Israeli hardliner Ariel Sharon.

Since then, each successive Friday noontime Muslim prayer encounter has been watched, recorded and analyzed for indications of where the broader dispute is heading.

On the weekend of Oct. 6-7, Israel emptied the Western Wall of Jewish prayergoers and handed security of the area over to Palestinian security forces; Orthodox Jews accused the government of “abandoning” the holy site. But on Oct. 13, Jews were allowed back in, while only 3,500 Muslims were granted access.

“We are surrounded by Israel’s occupation,” declared Sheikh Ekrima al Sabri, the preacher of Al Aksa Mosque. “Never before in my memory have so few Muslims been permitted to pray here.”

But the scrabble for religious space has not been limited to Jerusalem. A series of other religious sites _ both Jewish and Arab _ in Jericho, Jaffa, Tiberias and Nablus, also have been drawn into the vicious circle of mob attack, retaliation and counterattack.

At the very outset of the conflict, it was the Jewish-occupied Joseph’s Tomb that claimed the limelight. Set inside the West Bank Palestinian city of Nablus, the 16th century Islamic domed shrine is revered by Muslims as the burial place of a medieval Islamic sheikh named “Youssef” and in some Jewish circles as the burial place of the biblical patriarch Joseph.

Under the 1993 Oslo peace agreement, Israel withdrew from Nablus and the graceful domed Joseph’s Tomb became a tiny Jewish enclave within an Arab city. Concrete block walls strung with barbed wire were built around the medieval shrine transforming it into a fortified army camp. Arabs were barred altogether from the site, and Jews could gain access only with military permission.

Last weekend, after sustaining nine days of Palestinian attacks on the compound, which claimed the life of one Israeli soldier, Israel finally abandoned the tomb under the cover of night, prompting immediate cries of protest from the Israeli religious right.

The Palestinian residents of Nablus, meanwhile, quickly stormed the site, damaging the structure and attempting to set it on fire. One Jewish settler, Hillel Lieberman, was killed by Palestinians when he attempted to reach the tomb in desperation, after hearing that the site had been set afire.

Later this week, as sentiments cooled, the Palestinian Authority began to renovate Joseph’s Tomb, painting the domed site a gleaming white and green. On Friday, the site was re-opened and re-dedicated again as an Islamic shrine _ completing the cycle of religious conquest, retreat and withdrawal that so typifies this region.

Adel Yahya, a Palestinian archaeologist from Ramallah who is an expert on Islamic heritage sites, said it is ironic that some of the most vicious disputes over religious turf are due to the fact that Jews and Muslims have so much in common in terms of their heritage.

Both Jews and Muslims consider the biblical patriarchs Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Joseph as spiritual ancestors. And both religions look toward the holy sites of Jerusalem, Nablus and Hebron, either as sacred places of divine inspiration, or the burial grounds of sages.

But Rosen, the Orthodox rabbi who engages both sides in dialogue, said there is something larger at stake: national identity.

“National religious identity and spirituality are intertwined here, particularly among Jews and Muslims, much as it is in some of the Eastern Orthodox churches or among Polish and Irish Catholics.

“The question, for religious people, is whether these religious attachments lead to a greater appreciation for other human beings, or are expressed at the expense of the other person. Too often, it is the latter, and that is what we have to get beyond here in the Middle East.”

(OPTIONAL TRIM FOLLOWS)

As the saga of Joseph’s Tomb came to a close, a similar cycle seemed to be repeating itself in Jericho. There, on Thursday (Oct. 12) night, the ancient Jewish synagogue, famous for its mosaics, was attacked by angry Palestinian mobs, who set Torah scrolls and prayer books to flames.

The mob had swarmed the site in an angry response to Israeli helicopter gunship attacks on the West Bank city of Ramallah and Gaza earlier in the day _ attacks launched in reprisal for the Palestinian mob lynch of two Jewish reserve soldiers.

By Friday (Oct. 13) morning, however, when tempers had cooled, crews of Palestinian Authority workers were already being dispatched to the Jericho site by the Palestinian Authority to clean up the damage. Still, it was doubtful that the Jewish prayergoers who had frequented the synagogue in the past and studied there would be allowed near the site anytime soon, said area residents.

As much as the loss of life, the desecration and violence done to religious sites have left many Israeli doves confused and outraged.

“The Palestinians have destroyed any claim that they could make about being able to take responsibility for the holy places, by what they did at Joseph’s Tomb,” said former Israeli prime minister Shimon Peres, one of the leaders of last week’s Israeli peace camp.

KRE END FLETCHER