Jerusalem - Israeli police clashed with Palestinian rock throwers in Jerusalem's flashpoint Noble Sanctuary/Temple Mount compound Sunday morning, arresting at least 12, an Israeli police spokesman said. Mickey Rosenfeld the rioting began as police were on a routine patrol in the compound.
However, Israeli media sources said police accompanying a group of tourists onto the mount noticed a group of youth preparing barrels of oil to pour on the ground to hinder the progress of the visitors.
Police, who were pelted with rocks by Palestinian youth, dispersed the rioters with stun grenades, Rosenfeld said. Several rioters tookrefuge in the al-Aqsa Mosque in the compound.
Sporadic rock throwing continued in the adjacent narrow streets and alleyways of the Old City after rioting in the compound died down.
The compound, in the heart of the old City of Jerusalem,is the third holiest in Islam, because according to tradition it marks the spot from where the Prophet Mohammed ascended to heaven. But it is also the most sacred in Judaism, as it contains the ruins of the Jewish Biblical Temple.
Tensions in Jerusalem have been high since September 27, when rumours spread on the eve of the Jewish Yom Kippur holiday that Jews were trying to take over the compound, after after a group of French tourists made a pre-arranged, organized tour of the site under Israeli police escort.
Over the weekend, radical Muslim and Jewish clerics called on their followers to come to the compound.
