A masked Palestinian protester carries a burning tire during clashes with Israeli troops, following an anti-Israel demonstration over the entry restrictions to the al-Aqsa mosque, near the West Bank city of Ramallah October 31, 2014.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu urged lawmakers to show “responsibility and restraint” towards recent escalating tensions between Palestinians and Israeli security forces in Occupied Jerusalem, Reuters news agency reported.

Palestinians fear an Israeli plan to alter the status quo of the al-Aqsa mosque, the third holiest site in Islam, as far-right Jewish activists and politicians call for Jewish worship at the site.

Currently, access to the mosque is administered by Jordanian religious authorities but Israeli security forces have barred Palestinians from entry citing security concerns.

Following Benjamin’s statement, Moshe Feiglin, members of Israel’s right-wing Likud party and head of a campaign for Jewish worship, tweeted he would be heading to the al-Aqsa mosque on Sunday.

A fragile status quo has been set in place and if shaken may stir another Palestinian intifada, or uprising.

A sign of rising tensions, an outspoken advocate for Jewish prayer at the holy site was shot and seriously injured by a suspected Palestinian gunman, who was in turn hunted and killed following an exchange of fire with Israeli police.

At a rally for Yehuda Glick, Israeli Housing Minister Uri Ariel, member of far-right Jewish Home party, said he doesn’t accept “anyone threatening us here in the land of Israel, saying the situation is volatile and therefore we mustn’t go up.”

Consequently, the Palestinian’s deaths sparked more clashes prompting the Israeli police to shut down the complex for an entire day, an act Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said was “tantamount to a declaration of war.”

Separately, Netanyahu said Thursday Abbas had incited for violence when he said this month that “the (Jewish) settlers must be barred from entering the compound by any means.”

The Palestinian Intifada of 2000 began when Israeli right-wing then opposition leader visited the site, immediately after U.S.-brokered peace talks collapsed.

The complex is home to the golden Dome of the Rock, where Muslims believe Prophet Mohammed ascended to heaven. Jews revere it as the site of two destroyed Biblical Temples.

While the Israelis see Jerusalem as at their “indivisible and eternal” capital, a claim not recognized internationally, the Palestinians continue to push for East Jerusalem, annexed by Israel in the 1967 war, also a move not recognized by the international community.

 
[wpResize]