Who Controls the Holy Sites
Eight Arab and Muslim-majority countries condemned what they called Israel's repeated violations of the status quo of Jerusalem's holy sites in a joint statement on Thursday, putting the machinery of occupation and police protection at the center of the dispute. The foreign ministers of Qatar, Jordan, the UAE, Indonesia, Pakistan, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Egypt said Israeli occupation authorities were violating the legal status quo in Jerusalem's Islamic and Christian holy sites, while settlers and extremist ministers kept moving under the cover of state force.
The ministers highlighted what they called the continued incursions by Israeli settlers and extremist ministers into al-Aqsa Mosque/al-Haram al-Sharif [Temple Mount] under Israeli police protection, along with the raising of the Israeli flag within its courtyards. They called these actions provocative and said they were a flagrant violation of international law, as well as an unacceptable provocation to Muslims around the world and a flagrant violation of the sanctity of the holy city.
Settlers, Ministers, and the Police Shield
The statement put the hierarchy in plain view: settlers and extremist ministers enter the site, and Israeli police protect them. That arrangement, backed by occupation authorities, is what the ministers condemned as repeated violations of the status quo. The courtyards of al-Aqsa Mosque/al-Haram al-Sharif [Temple Mount] became the stage for the raising of the Israeli flag, a move the ministers described as part of the provocation.
The ministers stressed the importance of preserving the status quo and recognizing the special role of the historic Hashemite custodianship in this regard. Their statement framed the issue not as a matter of abstract diplomacy, but as a struggle over who gets to control access, worship, and the meaning of the site itself.
Settlement Expansion and Escalating Violence
The joint statement also denounced accelerating illegal settlement activity, including Israel's decision to approve over 30 new settlements. It condemned the continued and escalating settler violence against Palestinians, placing the costs of these decisions squarely on people living under the pressure of settlement expansion and repeated attacks.
Earlier this week, most of the ministers were also signatories in a joint statement, along with other countries, reproaching Israel's announcement that it is set to send a diplomatic envoy to Somaliland. That earlier statement showed the same diplomatic bloc pushing back against Israeli moves beyond Jerusalem, even as the facts on the ground continued to be shaped by occupation authorities and settlers.
The report also said National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir visited the Temple Mount with Rabbi Elisha Wolfson on Sunday, April 12, 2026, and called to expand Jewish worship at the site. That visit, 12 days ago, added another layer to the contest over the holy site, with a senior minister openly calling for expansion while police-backed incursions and flag displays were already drawing condemnation from Arab and Muslim-majority governments.
The statement from the eight countries did not change the structure of power on the ground. It did, however, lay out who is being protected, who is being pushed, and which institutions are enforcing the arrangement at Jerusalem's holy sites.