I wonder: is Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu getting piqued? Is Jordan’s behavior beginning to annoy him? Is the pressure Jordan is applying vis a vis the Temple Mount starting to bother even him?
First, despite promises to seek ways to permit Jews to pray on the Temple Mount, he succumbed to the so-called “status quo” (so-called because it is only static as regards Jews).
Second, when it was absolutely clear who was initiating violence and provocations (the Jordanian Waqf by allowing youths to infiltrate the Al-Aqsa Mosque and stay there overnight with firebombs, etc. as well as Sheikh Raad Salah’s Islamic Movement), he only spoke in a general fashion without blaming Jordan.
Third, he didn’t call out Jordan on the violation of Article Nine of the Jordan-Israel Peace Treaty.
Fourth, he traveled to Amman (and Berlin) to meet US Secretary of State John Kerry and King Abdallah II and bowed to the pressure of installing cameras.
Fifth, he stood idly by for some five months while nothing happens with the camera surveillance scheme.
Sixth, he demurred when the Waqf and Jordan announced that the cameras will not be placed inside the mosque or the Dome of the Rock thus completely undermining Israel’s case to prove Muslim-instigated violence.
And now we read that Jordan is protesting a rabbi storming of Jerusalem mosque :
Jordan Tuesday strongly protested a raid into Jerusalem's Al Aqsa Mosque compound, led by ultranationalist rabbi Yehuda Glick of the ruling Likud party, and urged Israel, as the occupation power, to stop such provocations.
State Minister for Media Affairs, official government spokesman, Mohammad Momani, said that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates Affairs, through its close monitoring of the Israeli violations of Al Aqsa Mosque/Haram al Sharif (holy sanctuary), which it considers a red line, today lodged an official protest to the Israeli embassy in Amman…the protest note also expressed rejection of any attempt to change the status quo at the holy compound or undermine the historic Hashemite custodianship of Islamic and Christian holy sites in East Jerusalem…Jordan would pursue its efforts through diplomacy and legal means to deter Israel and bring the breaches to a stop. He urged the world community and international organisations to help in this endeavour.
I do not know the Arab term for chutzpah but this is it. This is really much too much.
Will Mr. Netanyhau now remind Mr. Kerry that everything has been turned around? That Jordan pulled a fast one? That his willingness to compromise has only, yet again, worked against Israel?
Will he reject, officially, Jordan’s protest and lodge one of his on infractions of that Article Nine which reads:
Each party will provide freedom of access to places of religious and historical significance…The Parties will act together to promote interfaith relations among the three monotheistic religions, with the aim of working towards religious understanding, moral commitment, freedom of religious worship, and tolerance and peace.
Piqued? I would expect Mr. Netanyahu to be peeved and pestered.
The Temple Mount no less than the Western Wall deserves his attention.^