Israeli police detain head of Al Aqsa security over archaeological crimes

Earlier I reported on how over a thousand Muslims took advantage of the last day of Ramadan, a date that traditionally has only allowed Muslims on the Temple Mount, to take piles of important archaeological debris from previous illegal digs and use them to build terraces and benches, and to clean up the areas the debris was in, further destroying priceless objects.

Today, Israeli security forces belatedly tried to do something about these archaeological crimes.

According to Ma'an, Israeli police arrested the head of the security department at the al-Aqsa Mosque, Abdullah Abu Talib, and took him to the Bab al-Silsila police station.

At the same time security forces dismantled the terraces and removed the olive tree saplings planted in the area of the debris, that Muslims call the "Bab al Rahma" area.

Ma'an confirms that "at the end of Ramadan, hundreds of worshipers launched a campaign under the slogan "Bab al-Rahma ... a carpet of cleaning and reconstruction" to rebuild, improve, beautify and attract the Bab al-Rahma area. Within a few days, the worshipers managed to organize the Bab al-Rahma area, laying stone fences, high terraces, benches and stone tables as well as planting olive seedlings."

There is a tradition (and evidence) of a major gate to the Temple being in the area of Bab al Rahma, known in ancient times as Shushan Gate. (This is not the same as the visible and closed off Golden Gate off the eastern wall.) The debris is left over from the illegal Muslim digs of the late 1990s, I believe, in that area.

Ma'an has pictures of Muslims building short walls with the stones from the debris, and apparently of the dismantled benches that were built.

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