Jerusalem: Royal Commission for Jerusalem Affairs Secretary-General Abdullah Kanaan said on Saturday that the August 21, 1969, arson attack on Al-Aqsa Mosque brings to mind a crime that destroyed the famed 12th-century pulpit (minbar) of Saladin Al-Ayyubi and large sections of the southern Qibli prayer hall.
According to Jordan News Agency, in a statement on the anniversary of the historic fire, Kanaan reiterated the need for protecting Islamic and Christian holy sites in Jerusalem. The attack on Al-Aqsa Mosque did not stop with the fire incident, but continued through incursions, attempts to impose new facts, excavations, and temporal and spatial division plans coinciding with escalating attacks in the Palestinian territories, he said.
"What is happening in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, as well as attacks on Islamic and Christian sanctities, underscores the danger of the continuation of these policies on the religious and historical identity of Jerusalem and Palestine," he said. Kanaan called for supporting the steadfastness of the Palestinian people, providing humanitarian aid, and stopping the aggression, urging the international community to shoulder its responsibility and press for respect for international law and the existing historical status quo in Jerusalem.
He called for supporting Jordan's position and His Majesty King Abdullah II's efforts in safeguarding the Islamic and Christian holy sites in Jerusalem, based on the historical Hashemite custodianship over them. Kanaan noted that Jordan took the initiative, under royal directives, to reconstruct Al-Aqsa Mosque after the 1969 fire, and return the pulpit of Saladin to its place in 2007.
He urged stepped up international efforts to end the occupation and bring about peace based on the two-state solution, and the establishment of an independent Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital on the 1967 borders.