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Palestinian Arabs

'Ask PA to protect Gaza synagogues'


By Ryan Jones
September 07, 2005

Deliberations over the fate of Gaza?s abandoned synagogues continued Tuesday, with Israel?s High Court asking the Sharon government to seek PA protection for the houses of worship.

The government had originally wanted to demolish all but two of Gaza?s 30 synagogues, fearing they would be desecrated by Muslim ?Palestinians? if left intact.

But attorney Gilad Corinaldi filed a petition with the court last week on behalf of leading rabbis warning of the dangerous precedent razing the synagogues would set.

?It is better that gentiles desecrate Jewish places of worship than we humiliate ourselves doing it,? Corinaldi told The Jerusalem Post.

Israel?s Rabbinical Council followed up by issuing a ruling stating the destruction of synagogues by Jews was a violation of Jewish religious law.

The fear exists that the site of Jews abandoning the sanctity of their own houses of worship would result in increased anti-Semitism worldwide.

?On the basis of this halachic position, and in the context of diplomatic considerations,? the High Court asked whether Sharon believed ?it might be possible to make this official appeal? to the regime of PLO chief Mahmoud Abbas.

?If the answer is in the negative, we would ask him to explain why,? the court wrote.

When the issue was first raised last month, the PA indicated it would not guarantee the sanctity of the synagogues.

PA foreign ministry official Abdullah Abdullah Monday complained to aljazeera.net that Israel was purposely putting the ?Palestinians? in a difficult position.

?This is a very sensitive issue. We are Muslims and our religion and traditions don't allow us to desecrate or destroy places of worship.

?But we feel the Israelis are trying to entrap us by leaving these places intact and then tell the world ?look, the Palestinians are destroying Jewish holy places, the Palestinians show no respect for Jewish holy places,?? Abdullah said.

 It was unclear why Abdullah was concerned over the so-called entrapment if Islam forbade the ?Palestinian? Muslims to desecrate the synagogues.

 Palestinian Arab Muslims in fact have a long history of desecrating and destroying Jewish holy places in the region.

Between 1949 and 1967, during the Jordanian occupation of Jerusalem?s Old City, 60 synagogues were desecrated and destroyed, their ruins used to house livestock.

In a more recent and serious example, ?Palestinian? mobs ransacked the tomb of the Israeli patriarch Joseph in Shechem after IDF forces were ordered to withdraw from the religious complex in October 2000.

Three years later they finished the job by smashing the tombstone placed there in Joseph?s memory.

Abdullah went on to claim the Jews were waiting for the next such incident in order to justify an attack on the mosques occupying Israel?s holiest site ? Jerusalem?s Temple Mount.

?Muslim officials warned that Israel might want to deliberately leave the synagogues intact so that Palestinians would demolish them in order to justify [attacking] ? Jerusalem's Aqsa Mosque,? he said.

On Tuesday, Israeli Knesset Member Gila Finkelstein demanded the parliament adopt legislation forcing the government to obtain international guarantees ensuring protection of and unhindered access to Jewish holy sites.

?Because thus far the governments of Israel have ignored the destruction of Jewish holy sites [such as Joseph?s Tomb], it must be put into law that there is an equal obligation to protect the holy places of all religions, even after the [disengagement],? Arutz 7 quoted Finkelstein as saying.

?There is no reason for Jews to be unable to visit those places, as is allowed in the case of the Muslims.?

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