A Second Chance...

There's a well-known saying, "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me" that I believe is very appropriate for the current state of affairs relating to the ongoing illegal excavations by the Muslim Waqf on the Temple Mount.

The Jerusalem Post reports:

In a renewed dispute, a group of Israeli archaeologists has condemned the Wakf's planned renovation work of an ancient tower adjacent to the Temple Mount, warning that such a move is part of a long-running plan by the Islamic Trust to expand a recently-created mosque at the Jerusalem holy site.

"As part of our follow-up on Wakf activities over the last years, it has become clear that these projects are part of an overall Wakf plan to turn the whole compound into one exclusive Muslim site...and we have firm basis to suppose that the Wakf's aim this time as well is to take over this structure as well and incorporate it into the mosque at the site,"

The archaeologists' letter, which was made public on Wednesday, states that the prime minister's office and or the Antiquities Authority has approved or is planning to approve the Wakf's renovation plan.

This is not the first time the Temple Mount has been desecrated by the Muslim Waqf...

The latest controversy surrounding unsupervised Wakf work near Judaism's holiest site comes in the backdrop of the massive Wakf construction project carried out in the late 1990's at an underground architectural support of the Temple Mount known as the Solomon's Stables, which was illicitly converted into what is now the largest mosque in Israel.

Following the construction work, Wakf officials dumped more than 12,000 tons of earth, with history-rich artifacts, at a garbage dump outside the Old City, an action that the Antiquities Authority later called "an unprecedented archaeological crime."

We must ask ourselves the following question:

If we are unwilling (and when I say we, I don't just mean the Government of Israel, but all members of the Jewish People) to stand up for our holiest site - the Temple Mount - where out two Holy Temples once stood, and where the 3rd will be rebuilt, then what are we prepared to stand up for?

For Gush Katif and the Shomron? Clearly not.

For Hebron?

For Jerusalem?

For Tel Aviv?

Uri Zvi Greenberg, Jewish poet, said it best, with these words:

Whoever controls the Temple Mount controls the entire Land of Israel

Israel
Zionism
Judaism