Reuters, Jerusalem :Muslim men over 50 prayed at the Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem’s Old City on Friday amid intense security, a day after Israel closed all access to the sacred compound for the first time in more than a decade following violence on the streets.More than 1,000 Israeli police were deployed around the Old City’s cobbled streets and the ancient gates that lead to Al Aqsa, a spokeswoman said, in addition to undercover anti-riot units and observation balloons hovering in the sky.Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas denounced Thursday’s closure of the site as “tantamount to a declaration of war” and his political party called for a “day of rage” in protest at the move, prompting heightened security throughout the city.Worshippers wanting to enter the ornate marble-and-stone compound, which contains the golden Dome of the Rock and Al Aqsa mosque, the third holiest shrine in Islam, queued behind blue barricades to show their identification papers to the police.More than 4,000 people attended midday prayers, police said. There were a few isolated disturbances, including firecrackers being set off and an attempt by a group of young Palestinian men to break through the police cordon, but no serious violence. Israeli authorities shut all access to Al Aqsa after the shooting of Yehuda Glick, a far-right religious activist who has led a campaign for Jews to be allowed to pray at the site, which they refer to as Temple Mount.Glick, 48, was shot as he left a conference in Jerusalem on Wednesday. The man suspected of shooting him, a Palestinian from the neighborhood of Abu Tor in the eastern, mainly Arab side of the city, was shot dead by Israeli forces before dawn on Thursday, following an exchange of gunfire. [ID:nL5N0SP1JJ]Locals said it was the first time all access to Al Aqsa had been banned since the second Intifada, or Palestinian uprising, erupted in 2000. But Jordanian authorities, who are responsible for administering the site, said it was the first full closure of the compound since the 1967 Middle East war.Tensions have been high on the streets of East Jerusalem and around Al Aqsa for weeks, following the summer Gaza conflict and Israel’s moves to expand settlement building in eastern areas of the city, which the Palestinians want as the capital of an independent state alongside the Gaza Strip and the West Bank.Al Aqsa is a particularly sensitive issue. The elegant 38-acre (15 hectare) compound, lined with cypress trees, houses the 7th century Dome of the Rock, from where the Prophet Mohammad is said to have ascended into heaven.
