JERUSALEM (AP) — Chanting “Death to Arabs” and singing “May your village burn,” groups of young Israeli Jews made their way through Muslim neighborhoods of Jerusalem’s Old City on Monday during an annual march marking Israel’s conquest of the eastern part of the city.
Palestinian shopkeepers closed early and police lined the alleys ahead of the march that often becomes a rowdy and sometimes violent procession of ultranationalist Jews. A police officer raised his arms in celebration at one point, hugging a marcher. It was blazing hot, with temperatures hitting 98 degrees Fahrenheit (37 Celsius) in late afternoon.
Police kept a close watch as demonstrators jumped, danced and sang.
Hours earlier, a small group of protesters, including an Israeli member of parliament, stormed a compound in east Jerusalem belonging to the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees, known as UNRWA.
The march commemorates Jerusalem Day, which marks Israel’s capture of east Jerusalem, including the Old City and its holy sites sacred to Jews, Christians and Muslims, in the 1967 Mideast war. The event threatened to inflame tensions that are rife in the city after nearly 600 days of war in Gaza.
Jerusalem lies at the heart of the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians. Each sees the city as a key part of their national and religious identity. It is one of the most intractable issues of the conflict and is often a flashpoint.
Israel considers all of Jerusalem to be its eternal, undivided capital. Its annexation of east Jerusalem is not internationally recognized. Palestinians want an independent state with east Jerusalem as its capital.
Last year’s procession, during the first year of the war in Gaza, saw ultranationalist Israelis attack a Palestinian journalist in the Old City and call for violence against Palestinians. Four years ago, the march helped set off an 11-day war in Gaza.
Tour buses carrying young ultranationalist Jews lined up near entrances to the Old City, bringing hundreds from outside Jerusalem, including settlements in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
After this year’s march ended, Arab shopkeepers darted outside to begin scrubbing their shops, now covered with stickers reading “Gaza is ours.”
Police, who called the procession the “Dance of Flags,” said they had detained a number of people and “acted swiftly to prevent violence, confrontations and provocations.”
Speaking in an east Jerusalem archaeological park located in a Palestinian neighborhood, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pledged to “preserve a united, whole Jerusalem, and the sovereignty of Israel.” He said the government was encouraging foreign embassies to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and investing billions of shekels in the city’s development.
Volunteers from the pro-peace organization Standing Together and the Free Jerusalem collective, which works with Palestinians in Jerusalem, tried to position themselves between the marchers and residents to prevent violence.
One shopkeeper swept the floor after marchers tipped over his bale of bay leaves. A group of young Jewish Israelis followed a Palestinian woman through the streets, calling her “charmouta” — Arabic for “whore.”
“This is our home, this is our state,” one protester shouted at a Palestinian woman.
“Go away from here!” she responded, in Hebrew.
Increased Jewish visits to a flashpoint holy site
Israel’s far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, who oversees the country’s police force, visited a hilltop compound holy to Jews and Muslims, where Al-Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock are located. One Israeli lawmaker, Yitzhak Kroizer, could be seen praying.
Perceived encroachments by Jews on the site have set off widespread violence on a number of occasions going back decades. Hamas accused Israel of “desecrating” the site when it launched its Oct. 7, 2023 attack.
“We are marking a holiday for Jerusalem,” Ben-Gvir said, accompanied by other lawmakers and a rabbi. “There are truly many Jews flooding the Temple Mount. How nice to see that.”
Beyadenu, an activist group that encourages Jewish visits to the site, said dozens of people had ascended to the compound draped in the Israeli flag, and had prayed there.
Since Israel captured the site in 1967, a tenuous understanding between Israeli and Muslim religious authorities at the compound has allowed Jews — who revere the site as the Temple Mount, the location of the biblical temples — to visit but not pray there.
Ben-Gvir said he is changing that status quo. Palestinians say it has long been eroding because of an increase in Jewish visits.
“Today, thank God, it is possible to pray on the Temple Mount,” Ben-Gvir said, according to a statement from his office.
The prime minister’s office said there has been no change to the status quo. Police said Monday’s march would not enter the site.
For many in Israel, Jerusalem Day is a joyous occasion that marks a moment of redemption in their country’s history, when access to the key Jewish holy site of the Western Wall was restored and the city was unified. But in recent years, the Jerusalem Day march has been dominated by young nationalist and religious Israelis.
Protesters storm U.N. compound in Jerusalem
UNRWA West Bank coordinator Roland Friedrich said around a dozen Israeli protesters, including Yulia Malinovsky, one of the legislators behind an Israeli law that banned UNRWA, forcefully entered the compound, climbing its main gate in view of Israeli police.
Protesters held a banner calling for the compound to be turned into an Israeli settlement. Israel’s housing minister said last year he had instructed the ministry to “examine how to return the area to the state of Israel and utilize it for housing.”
Israel has accused the agency, the biggest aid provider in Gaza, of being infiltrated by Hamas, allegations the U.N. has denied.
There was no immediate comment from Israeli police.
The compound has stood mainly empty since the end of January, after UNRWA asked staff not to work from there, fearing for their safety. The U.N. says it has not vacated the compound and that it is protected under international law.
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