(TELEGRAPH) — The Jewish visitors knew within seconds that they had entered hostile territory.
Scores of hooded Palestinian women, their faces covered, chanted a shrill chorus of Allah-u akbar (God is great) as wary policemen looked on.
A police officer used a video camera to film one woman who, holding the hand of a toddler carrying a toy gun, protested the newcomers’ arrival with particular vehemence.
The scene of the confrontation was the Al Aqsa Mosque complex, the most sensitive – and hotly contested – religious shrine in Jerusalem’s historic Old City, and known to Jews as the Temple Mount.
Such scenes have become increasingly common in recent months as radical Jewish groups – often backed by Right-wing Israeli politicians – have entered the site trying to claim worship rights in the face of opposition from Muslims, who insist it is rightfully and exclusively theirs.
