JERUSALEM / ISTANBUL

Far-right Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir on Tuesday stormed the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in occupied East Jerusalem for the second time in a week, a Palestinian agency said.

Jerusalem’s Islamic Endowments Directorate and witnesses said the extremist minister entered the flashpoint site under heavy Israeli police protection.

Last week, Ben-Gvir made a similar incursion at the start of the Jewish Sukkot holiday, a move that drew widespread Palestinian condemnations.

The incursion was not announced in advance, while Israeli ministers are only allowed to enter the site with prior approval from the office of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Since assuming his post in 2022, Ben-Gvir has forced his way into the Al-Aqsa Mosque complex 13 times, including 10 times since the start of Israel’s war on Gaza in October 2023.

On Monday, the Islamic Endowments Council in Jerusalem said that the mosque compound witnessed “the worst demolition of its historical and legal status in modern times,” particularly throughout 2025.

The council said in a statement that Israeli authorities and extremist Jewish groups have recently carried out “flagrant and unprecedented violations,” including “large-scale incursions into the courtyards of Al-Aqsa Mosque, desecration of its sanctity, and attempts to alter its Islamic identity” through practices by Jewish extremists as Talmudic rituals, chanting, dancing, flag-waving, and even offering animal and plant sacrifices inside the compound.

Al-Aqsa Mosque is the world's third-holiest site for Muslims. Jews call the area Temple Mount, claiming it was the site of two Jewish temples in ancient times.

Israel occupied East Jerusalem, where Al-Aqsa is located, during the 1967 Arab-Israeli War. It annexed the entire city in 1980 in a move never recognized by the international community.

In a landmark opinion last July, the International Court of Justice declared Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territory illegal and called for the evacuation of all settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.