PA governor: Archaeological excavations in Jerusalem’s Old City “constitute a direct danger to the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque”

Headline: “The inauguration of the Pilgrimage Road – forging history and turning the facts on their head”

“The occupation state inaugurated a tunnel yesterday [June 30, 2019] called the Pilgrimage Road (see note below –Ed.) under the town of Silwan (sic., a neighborhood in Jerusalem)… after six years of excavations in the bowels of the earth.

US Ambassador to Israel David Friedman and US President [Donald Trump’s] Envoy to the Middle East Jason Greenblatt participated in the inauguration ceremony of the Pilgrimage Road…

Jerusalem District Governor Adnan Ghaith… warned that these excavations and the network of tunnels, whose number rises daily and all of which go in the direction of the Al-Aqsa Mosque, constitute a direct danger to the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque and its near surroundings. He added that they are liable to cause collapses soon in the areas where these tunnels are being excavated, as well as collapses within the Al-Aqsa Mosque or its near surroundings.

Jerusalem affairs researcher and member of the Committee to Protect the Lands of Silwan Fakhri Abu Diab explained that the planning of this settlement project began in 2005, and that [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu signed it in 2010, when the work on it officially began. He noted that its goal is to connect the path to the alleged Temple (sic., the tunnel provides access to a path used by Jewish pilgrims visiting the Second Temple)…

Expert on Jerusalem affairs Jamal Amr… noted that this land is Canaanite and existed 4,000 years before Israel, but the occupation is attempting to impose the Israeli narrative.”

Pilgrimage Road – US Ambassador to Israel David Friedman, US Envoy Jason Greenblatt, and US Senator Lindsey Graham took part in the inauguration ceremony of the Pilgrimage Road underground archaeological site, located south of the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, on June 30, 2019. The excavated road was used by Jewish pilgrims visiting the Second Temple around the first century CE, and the Arab neighborhood of Silwan has since been built above it.