Islamic clerics from east Jerusalem attended a virtual conference alongside leaders from Hezbollah and Hamas on Tuesday marking "Annual Global Jerusalem Day."
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Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, who was also in attendance, said, "Jerusalem has an axis that creates a strong, solid regional equation to protect and liberate [it]."
The conference was also attended by Ekrima Sabri, a leading Temple Mount cleric and former Grand Mufti of Jerusalem;
, the archbishop of the Greek Orthodox Church in Jerusalem who regularly attacks Israel and has accused it of trying to poison him; and senior Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad officials.
During riots at the Temple Mount in recent weeks, Sabri called on the Palestinian public to increase its presence at the holy site and defend the Al-Aqsa mosque against Israeli actions.
At Tuesday's virtual conference, he assailed normalization with Israel and said, "The majority of Arab countries are busy with internal struggles or normalization with Israel, but this doesn't absolve them of responsibility. The [Islamic] nation is obligated to defend the residents of Jerusalem."
Religious Zionist Party chairman MK Bezalel Smotrich responded: "Israel's security services need to arrest the mufti Ekrima Sabri as early as [Tuesday night] and bring him to justice. I can't imagine that [Ra'am party chairman Mansour] Abbas' strong ties with Sabri and the fact that this government depends on Abbas would prevent such a critical security measure from being implemented."
According to Atallah, "Jerusalem was and will remain for its residents; the policy of the occupation [Israel] in it is illegal. The Islamic and Christian holy places are under attack and there are severe provocations in Jerusalem. We are in one boat in the defense of Jerusalem, and the occupation will not succeed in stealing it from its owners."
'The issue of Al-Aqsa won't be decided in negotiations'
Nasrallah added: "The growing resistance axis should also be called the Jerusalem axis because Jerusalem is the central point, and it has a sword in Gaza that protects it, as it did last year [during Israel's Operation Guardian of the Walls]. Israel has relied on the [Arab] peoples forgetting the Palestinian issue, but it is alive and has supporters and fighters who are willing to sacrifice on its behalf."
PIJ leader Ziyad al-Nakhala said at the conference that "Iran embraces the resistance and is developing a horizon for the fighters to achieve the victory. The Palestinian nation is proving it isn't giving up or negotiating over Jerusalem."
Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh said, "The heroic [terrorist] attacks showed that the option of resistance belongs to the entire nation and not to one faction or another," and added that the "issues of Al-Aqsa, the right of return [for Palestinian refugees], and [Palestinian] security prisoners [in Israeli prisons] won't be resolved through negotiations."
Any attempt to "cross the red lines in Al-Aqsa will become a regional conflict," Haniyeh added.
'Nasrallah realizes he has no horizon'
Meanwhile, GOC Northern Command Maj. Gen. Amir Baram said on Tuesday that "in two days, Hezbollah will mark 'Iranian Jerusalem Day' – an event that is commemorated by Iran and its various proxies. As every year, Nasrallah will mark the day with hateful, bombastic rhetoric, but it's important to note that even on this 'day of celebration,' he won't dare leave the bunker in which he's been hiding for many years now.
"His threats against us, from his hiding place in [Beirut's] Dahiyeh neighborhood, are the best proof of his understanding that he and his organization have no horizon. This year, too, Nasrallah will threaten and wag his finger at us Israelis, but he won't offer anything – certainly not progress or prosperity for his community or the country of Lebanon, which is struggling to attain any sort of positive social and economic objective.
"Hezbollah is at the top of the list of global terrorist organizations: Outcast and blocked off in all civilized countries, behaving like the mafia to manage a global operation of drug trafficking, money laundering, crime, murder of its critics, and terror.
"Even though the population in southern Lebanon is the organization's main supporter base, Nasrallah and his officers continue using the Shiite residents of the south as a human shield against Israel. The conclusion is obvious: The country of Lebanon, which allows Hezbollah to continue existing inside it in such a manner, is more of a con than a proper nation-state.
"Only a little less than 48 hours ago, we dealt with a Palestinian terrorist attempt from Lebanon to disrupt our daily lives. One rocket [fired by Hamas-affiliated Palestinian terrorists], which didn't cause any damage this time, was countered by the IDF's 91st Division, which fired more than 50 artillery shells into Lebanon. Certain elements wanted to further ignite the sector and disrupt the daily lives of our citizens. We won't allow it: Life in the north is going on per normal, and that's how we'll make sure things remain," Baram said.
In his conclusion, Baram directly addressed the leaders of Lebanon, saying, "We view the Lebanese government and Lebanese Army as responsible for this terror. In the previous attempts in which you mistakenly acted from Lebanese territory against the State of Israel, you paid a heavy price that ultimately set Lebanon back decades."
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