JERUSALEM — More than 1,300 Jewish settlers and members of far-right groups stormed the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in occupied East Jerusalem on Thursday morning in one of the largest incursions this year as they marked a Jewish holiday, Palestinian officials say.Far-right Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir also entered the site under heavy police protection on Thursday for Tisha B’Av, a Jewish day of mourning that marks the destruction twice of an ancient Jewish temple believed to have stood at the site known to Muslims as Al-Aqsa and to Jews as the Temple Mount.Israeli forces imposed tight restrictions at the mosque’s gates and around Jerusalem’s Old City, deploying heavily across its courtyards and preventing Palestinian worshippers from entering, it added.The Palestinian administration of the Jerusalem governorate said the number of Israelis entering the site was expected to keep rising until sundown, perhaps reaching 5,000, which would exceed the numbers recorded in previous years during the same Jewish holiday.The initial figure the governorate gave was for a three-hour period, it said.Only a very limited number of Palestinians managed to reach the mosque for dawn prayers before Israeli forces assaulted several worshippers and other residents, the governorate said in a statement.The governorate said the occupiers performed Talmudic rituals chanting loudly during the incursions in the eastern section of the compound.It added that “extremist groups advocating the construction of a Jewish temple at the site were mobilizing supporters in an effort to bring 5,000 occupiers into the compound” during Thursday’s incursions.The incursions are expected to continue into Friday and “could spark further confrontations”, noting that Friday prayers at the compound usually draw thousands of worshippers.The governorate condemned Ben-Gvir’s storming of the compound as a “dangerous escalation” and a “flagrant violation” of its historical and legal status quo.It said the move was part of “systematic targeting of Islamic holy sites” and attempts to impose new realities at the mosque.The governorate said Ben-Gvir’s participation, alongside incursions by occupiers and groups advocating the construction of a “Jewish temple” at the site, marked a “dangerous shift” from attacks by extremist groups to the Israeli government’s official adoption of such actions.It warned that the violations could have repercussions for regional security and stability and urged the international community and international institutions to act to halt them.The governorate stressed that the entire 144-dunam (35.6-acre) Al-Aqsa Mosque compound is “an exclusively Islamic place of worship,” saying any measures aimed at changing its identity or historical and legal status are “invalid and illegitimate.”Likud party lawmaker Amit Halevi also stormed the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound on Thursday morning.The participation of Israel’s ruling Likud party figures marked a “fundamental political shift” as Palestinian and Muslim officials argued that calls for rebuilding a temple at the site are now endorsed by key figures in the Israeli government and the Knesset.Al-Aqsa Mosque is the world’s third-holiest site for Muslims. Jews refer to the area as the Temple Mount, claiming it was the site of two Jewish temples in ancient times.Israeli media reported that police allowed more than 1,000 Israelis to pray at the site on Thursday. While non-Muslims are allowed to visit the site, they are forbidden from praying there as part of a 1967 agreement.Ben-Gvir said Jews visiting the site on Tisha B’Av “feel like the owners”, praising what he called “tremendous progress” there, the Haaretz newspaper reported.The Palestinian Ministry of Endowments and Religious Affairs earlier condemned calls for the incursions as a “dangerous escalation” aimed at altering the historical and legal status quo at the site and urged the international community to press Israel to halt them.Palestinian group Hamas warned that these “blatant acts of aggression will backfire on the occupation and its settlers”.Meanwhile, Jordan’s foreign ministry ⁠condemned Ben-Gvir’s visit, saying it was “a desecration of the sanctity of the mosque, an ‌escalation, a barbaric act, and unacceptable provocation.”Foreign ministry spokesman Fouad Majali warned that such actions violate the site’s historical and legal status quo.Amman urged the international community to pressure Israel to halt what it described as ongoing violations against Islamic and Christian holy sites in Jerusalem.Israel occupied Jerusalem during the 1967 Arab-Israeli war and annexed it in 1980, a move not recognized internationally.