These past few weeks have witnessed hundreds of thousands of Jews ascend the steep slopes of Jerusalem’s Old City and reconnect with their creator through a 3,000-year-old façade. These Jews gather in their masses and beg for forgiveness for the sins and mistakes they made during the year. And what a year it has been. A year of immense sorrow, pain, and suffering not beheld by the Jewish people since the Holocaust.
I am stunned every time I face the Western Wall of the Temple Mount.
Growing up, my dati leumi (National Religious) family often intertwined the Jewish presence in this land with yearning for the rebuilding of Jerusalem. This hopeful rejuvenation of the Jewish Temple is symbolized by the last standing remnant of the one destroyed by Roman emperor Titus nearly 2,000 years ago.
My religious practices have since faded in time, making me a datlash – an Israeli who was raised religious and later became non-observant, even if still being a believer – but the Western Wall still carries the weight of my belief in the Jewish people’s eternal covenant with God.
These recent years of detachment from Jewish prayer and activity have distanced me from the values and beliefs I grew up on. I was severely lacking a medium for reconnecting with God, especially during the difficult period we Israelis are currently facing. I wondered if perhaps visiting the origin location of our Jewish faith would instill within me the connection I yearned for.
The recent period of slihot (penitential prayers) before Yom Kippur was always a time of inner reflection, a time when I could take a step back and observe my actions and sentiments of the passing year.
Indeed, it speaks to me.
The vista of countless Jews from all parts of the globe gathering in prayer and unity at the Western Wall. The words they whisper or cry out are full of desire and faith. Their wishes and gratitude echo along the rough stone slabs in such a way that even a mere touch often sends shock waves through one’s body. This wall was the closest point of contact a person of Jewish faith could achieve with his eternal maker – until 1967, that is.
AS THE IDF battled its way through the Old City [in the Six Day War], securing house after house, Jordanian stronghold after stronghold, it quickly found its way to the Western Wall. From that point, there was only one last section of the ancient city left to secure. As the Israeli paratroopers advanced through one of the 10 gates that lead to the Temple Mount, I can only imagine the feelings of elation these soldiers must have felt as they climbed those final steps to the Dome of the Rock, the crown jewel of the Holy Land.
The soldiers, regardless of devoutness to the Jewish faith, were surely awestruck by reaching the holiest of sites known to Judaism, the holy location we pray toward in every fixed prayer, every Holy Day, every simcha (joyous event), and every Shabbat without fail, lest we forget our own right hand.
To the Western Wall and the Temple Mount
As I entered the Mughrabi Bridge, the odd wooden elongated structure to the right of the Western Wall’s main area that serves as the only non-Muslim gateway to the Temple Mount, these emotions fluttered inside me. I was about to enter a place that, according to many religious scholars and my practicing parents who raised me, I was not fit to behold, often told to wait for our third temple to be built.
But I decided that the time to wait was up. As the Middle East’s complex reality continuously unfolds before my eyes, I felt that I may be waiting a very long time for this third temple to arrive, and I couldn’t resist my adventurous spirit, supported by the open invitation extended to me on the part of the Jerusalem Center for Foreign Affairs to see what all the hype is about.
The early autumn sunshine did not bode well for the trapped air inside the bridge, and so our police escort was very quick with his instructions. “Do not pray, do not linger” – that looks like prayer – “and most importantly, do not approach anyone.” His thick accent and name tag indicated he was Muslim.
At that moment, I understood we were neither visitors nor tourists. We were a threat to the status quo, a hindrance to the everyday reality upon the Temple Mount. Jews, although holding all the guns and the gates, did not hold the authority regarding what goes on atop this holiest of hills.
OUR ESCORT led us up the makeshift bridge until we reached the Temple courtyard. The first impression given was that this artificial plateau stretched far and wide to such an extent that you felt as if half of the Old City was hidden from the non-Muslim public. The Jerusalem stone was clean, the marble pathways clear, and the entire compound was bathed in a glorious sunny glow, adding a visual sense of holiness to it all.
To the right of us was the Aqsa Mosque, the namesake of the Oct. 7 Hamas massacre – they call it “Al-Aqsa Flood” – of 1,145 Israelis and foreign nationals, only 301 of whom were soldiers. The terror group continuously claims its actions are bent on protecting the third-holiest Muslim site from “infidel” contamination and destruction. Yet non–Muslims are barred from entry, a rule upheld and enforced by the Israeli security forces, nullifying Hamas’s doctrine as one of baseless religious paranoia.
This point, however true, is redundant in the eyes of many Muslims. One of the five pillars of Islam is Shahada, or faith. To emulate this faith, warfare is considered a necessary and legitimate channel for its expression. This pillar, coupled with the fundamental Islamic belief that Muslims must at some point wage war against a Dar al harb – a non-Muslim state that subjugates and abuses its Muslim population – cultivates the fertile ground for violent fundamental Islam to sprout among the Palestinian ideology in east Jerusalem and the West Bank.
Hamas, along with its many supporters in the Palestinian-populated areas, indeed perceives Israel as this evil state that prevents Muslims from practicing their faith and denying them living standards on par with those granted by a Dar al Islam – a Muslim state, such as the Ottoman Empire or the Jordanian kingdom.
These fundamental religious beliefs, held by the vast majority of the Palestinian people, are key to understanding their support of Hamas and their animosity toward any Israeli presence on religious soil – especially this holiest site after Mecca and Medina in Saudi Arabia.
You could genuinely feel this animosity when atop the Temple Mount. The Jordanian guards of religion, known as the Waqf, are ever-present, glaring eyes forever observing and scrutinizing every motion. I was shouted at for standing still and facing the Aqsa Mosque entrance. I was trying to get the perfect shot with my camera, and the guard suspected me of sneaking in a little prayer behind the lens.
The darting eyes and sneering glances were uncomfortable and indeed conveyed their intended message of “You aren’t wanted here,” but I was simply blind and deaf to these sentiments. I was entranced by the realization that I was standing at the pinnacle of Jewish faith and history.
At that moment, I was in the place our ancestors have prayed to since their exile. I stood on the ground upon which my entire existence is based. The most important notion I want to convey here is that I felt these things not as a devout and practicing Jew but as a believing one.
THE MUSLIM time for prayer neared, and we were instructed to leave the compound. I was sad and reluctant to do so, lingering upon the steps outside the Dome of the Rock, trying to take it all in before it was over, to breathe in the air somewhat different from that found on the other side of the Western Wall.
I left the Temple Mount, and so did a fraction of my soul. I felt it fall behind, unable to detach itself from where it must have originated.
I will never forget those two hours on the Temple Mount, and I highly suggest you join me on my next visit – at whatever level of observance you maintain (your own stringency permitting). Some Orthodox Jews won’t go up because it’s too holy; other Jews won’t because they’re not interested and see no reason to.
In my eyes, walking upon Mount Moriah is the closest interaction to Hashem’s presence one can experience on this Earth, an existential journey no words can express.