Set to enter Knesset, Yehuda Glick says he will stay away from Temple Mount
Published May 22, 2016
JERUSALEM (JTA) — Yehuda Glick, an Israeli activist who wants Jews to be allowed to pray on the Temple Mount, said he would stay away from the holy site after he is sworn in as a member of Knesset.
Glick, who was 33rd on the Likud Party’s candidates’ list in the last elections, will enter the Knesset following the resignation of Defense Minister Moshe Yaalon.
Following the advice of security advisors, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu several weeks ago ordered Knesset members to refrain from visiting the Temple Mount, due to the tensions over the site.
Glick told Haaretz he would not be upset to give up the opportunity to sit in the Knesset if Yaalon changes his mind.
“I was afraid that I’d join the Knesset after someone was caught doing something shameful and having to resign and I’m glad that didn’t happen. I’m very sorry Ya’alon has gone. I think the nation owes him a great debt and that this is a big loss for the Likud party,” he told Haaretz. “If he changes his mind I’ll be the first to rejoice. I do understand the constraints Netanyahu was operating under and I have no complaints.”
Glick, 50, has visited the Temple Mount frequently, leading tours there for other Jews. He leads a coalition of groups seeking greater Jewish access to the site, including one whose objectives, according to its website, include “liberating the Temple Mount from Arab (Islamic) occupation” and “removing” the Dome of the Rock and the Al Aqsa mosque from the site.
A Muslim trust, the Jordanian Waqf, administers the site, which is holy to Jews and Arabs.
In October 2014, Glick was seriously wounded in an attempted assassination at the Menachem Begin Center in Jerusalem by a Palestinian gunman.
Glick, 50, a resident of the West Bank settlement of Otniel, was born in the United States and is an ordained rabbi.
Glick told Israel Hayom that in the Knesset, he would work to “turn Jerusalem and the Temple Mount into a nexus of world peace and promote justice and peace, and always keep Jerusalem in my thoughts. Jerusalem is Zion, and the Temple Mount lies at its center.”
