LONDON: Israeli authorities have issued an order to seize the roof of the inner courtyard of the Ibrahimi Mosque in the city of Hebron, in the south of the occupied West Bank, a Palestinian settlements watchdog revealed.
The Wall and Settlement Resistance Commission reported that an Israeli expropriation order, issued on Monday, mandates the seizure of 288 sq. meters of the designated roof area.
Muayyad Shaaban, the head of the commission, said that the order follows a decision made last February to transfer authority over the Ibrahimi Mosque from the Palestinian Ministry of Endowments to the Israeli Civil Planning Authority.
In July, the supervisory authority over parts of the Ibrahimi Mosque was officially transferred from the Hebron Municipality to the Religious Council in Kiryat Arba for management and structural changes.
The Palestinian Authority’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates has said that Israel’s decision to transfer the management of the mosque, known to Jews as the Cave of the Patriarchs, to a settlement council is “an unprecedented move to impose control over it, Judaize it, alter its identity, and a blatant violation of international law and UN resolutions.”
