© Richard Randall

Caribbean

Sundries

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The Wall as viewed by Muslims

The site is also holy to Muslims who believe Solomon to be a prophet. Muslims believe that Muhammad made a spiritual journey to Jerusalem on a winged horse, al-Buraq, in 620 AD. While there, he tethered the horse to a wall, which some Muslims believe to be the Western wall. Hence the Arabic name for the wall is the al-Buraq Wall. Due to the holiness of the site in Islam, in 687 AD Muslims built the Dome of the Rock and the nearby Al-Aqsa Mosque on the Temple Mount, encompassed by the wall.

Ottoman control

By 1517 Islamic Ottoman Empire under Selim I took the land of what was once ancient Israel and Judea from the Egyptian Mamelukes (1250-1517). Turkey had a benevolent attitude towards the Jews, having welcomed thousands of Jewish refugees who had recently been expelled from Spain by Ferdinand II of Aragon and Isabella of Castile in 1492. The Turkish Sultan, Suleiman the Magnificent, was so taken with Jerusalem and its plight that he ordered a magnificent, surrounding, fortress-wall built around the entire city (which was not that large at that time.) This wall still stands and can be seen today.

Under the British

Following Britain's victories during the Sinai and Palestine Campaigns under Field Marshal Edmund Allenby, the British took control of the land in 1917. Jews were allowed to stand at the wall and pray.

The Arab riots in Palestine of 1929 broke out partly because the Arabs claimed variously that the Jews were trying to build a synagogue near the wall or take over the site. In 1931 the British government issued a document affirming Muslim property rights to the wall and placing strictures on Jewish observance.

Jordanian rule

During the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, the area near the wall was taken over by the Jordanian Arab Legion. Jews were denied access to the wall, in violation of the 1949 armistice agreement, and buildings were constructed within a few meters of the wall. During the 1967 Six Day War, Israel defeated the Jordanian army in Jerusalem with fierce fighting. Jordan lost the wall and it came under Jewish control for the first time in 2,000 years.

Israel since 1967

Following the victory of the Israel Defense Forces during the 1967 Six-Day War, the Western Wall, together with all of Jerusalem and the West Bank came under Israeli control. The Israelis demolished the medieval Moroccan Quarter in front of the Western Wall facing away from the Temple Mount, and built a large plaza in its place which is used by tens of thousands of Jews on the Jewish holidays, and is a favorite tourist attraction year round.

Many foreign heads of state who visit Israel, come to the Wall, out of their respect for its significance to Israel and to Jews worldwide. The Western Wall continues to have a powerful hold on the devotion of Jews all over the world. Over the decades, millions have come as tourists and pilgrims to be able to touch the Wall with their hands and feel the sanctity that emanates from it.

Recent damage to plaza

• On February 16, 2004, a portion of a stone retaining wall that forms one side of the Western Wall Plaza and supports the ramp that leads from the Western Wall plaza to the Gate of the Moors (Hebrew Sha'ar HaMughrabim, Arabic Bab al-Maghariba) and on the Temple Mount collapsed. [2]

• On March 30, 2005, The word "Allah" in Arabic was found hewn into the eastern wall of Jerusalem's Temple Mount. The vandalism was discovered on a half-meter section of the 2,000 year old wall, which is undergoing repair by a team of Jordanian engineers.

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