{"id":313221,"date":"2026-02-27T15:33:08","date_gmt":"2026-02-27T15:33:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/313221\/"},"modified":"2026-02-27T15:33:08","modified_gmt":"2026-02-27T15:33:08","slug":"100000-pray-at-al-aqsa-amid-israeli-restrictions-on-2nd-friday-of-ramadan-israel-palestine-conflict-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/313221\/","title":{"rendered":"100,000 pray at Al-Aqsa amid Israeli restrictions on 2nd Friday of Ramadan | Israel-Palestine conflict News"},"content":{"rendered":"

Thousands of worshippers attend prayers at Al-Aqsa Mosque, with others turned away despite carrying required permits.<\/p>\n

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Published On 27 Feb 202627 Feb 2026<\/p>\n

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About 100,000 Palestinian worshippers have prayed at the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in occupied East Jerusalem for the second Friday of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, despite Israel imposing severe restrictions on access to the holy site.<\/p>\n

Worshippers were subjected to thorough security screening on Friday as they made their way through the Qalandiya checkpoint in the occupied West Bank north of Jerusalem to pray, an Al Jazeera team reported, amid a heavy deployment of Israeli forces around the city.<\/p>\n

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Israeli authorities imposed rules at the start of Ramadan to limit entry for Friday prayers to just 10,000 Palestinian worshippers with daily permits \u2013 a small fraction of the hundreds of thousands who would attend in normal years.<\/p>\n

Under the Israeli rules, only men over 55, women 50 years or older, and children under 12, accompanied by a relative, are permitted to enter.<\/p>\n

Visitors are also required to complete digital verification procedures at crossings when returning to the West Bank.<\/p>\n

\"MuslimMuslim worshippers make their way to the Al-Aqsa Mosque to attend the second Friday noon prayers of the holy month of Ramadan [Hazem Bader\/AFP]Bans on individuals<\/p>\n

As well as the restrictions, Israeli authorities recently announced bans on 280 Jerusalem residents, including religious figures, journalists, and released prisoners, from attending prayers at Al-Aqsa Mosque.<\/p>\n

The push to limit Palestinians\u2019 access to the holy site during Ramadan is widely seen as part of an effort to pressure Palestinian communities and erase the Palestinian cultural identity of occupied East Jerusalem, which Palestinians view as the capital of their future state.<\/p>\n

The restrictions have further increased since the genocidal war on Gaza began in October 2023.<\/p>\n

\"MuslimMuslims perform Friday noon prayers at the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound [Ahmad Gharabli\/AFP]Turned away despite permits<\/p>\n

Despite the restrictions, attendance at the mosque was considerably higher than the supposed cap of 10,000 visitors, as it was the previous week<\/a>, when Jerusalem\u2019s Islamic Waqf, the religious authority that administers the compound, said 80,000 people attended the first Friday prayers of Ramadan.<\/p>\n

Yet many Palestinians who attempted to attend, including some who said they had the necessary permits, found themselves turned away by Israeli authorities.<\/p>\n

Najati Oweida, who travelled from Hebron, told Anadolu that Israeli soldiers turned him back despite presenting a permit.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe occupation claims it has provided facilitation, but the procedures are strict,\u201d he said. \u201cI only want to pray at Al-Aqsa. Why am I being prevented?\u201d<\/p>\n

Another man, Ali Nawas, 58, told the news agency that he and his wife had travelled for more than an hour from Nablus in the occupied West Bank, only for his wife to be turned back at the Qalandiya checkpoint, despite her having a permit.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was forced to return with her. How could she go back to Nablus alone?\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Thousands of worshippers attend prayers at Al-Aqsa Mosque, with others turned away despite carrying required permits. Listen to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":313222,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[85,46,44,47,43,11420,45,48],"class_list":{"0":"post-313221","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-israel","8":"tag-il","9":"tag-israel","10":"tag-israel-palestine-conflict","11":"tag-middle-east","12":"tag-news","13":"tag-occupied-east-jerusalem","14":"tag-occupied-west-bank","15":"tag-palestine"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/313221","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=313221"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/313221\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/313222"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=313221"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=313221"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=313221"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}