Senior Hamas leaders went to Moscow to speak with Russian officials – report

A delegation of senior Hamas leaders went to Moscow to meet with Russian officials, following the conflicts on the Temple Mount, to discuss what is happening in Jerusalem, according to a report from Walla on Wednesday morning.

A correspondent for pro-Hezbollah media outlet Al Mayadeen said in Moscow that the Hamas delegation is being headed by Hamas Deputy Chairman Mousa Mohammed Abu Marzook.

Muhammad Hamadeh, the Hamas spokesman for Jerusalem, said on Tuesday that “harming the Al-Aqsa mosque is playing with detonators,” Hamas media reported.

Hamadeh further added in a press interview that the decision of Hamas’s military wing, Al-Qassam Brigades, to adopt the Salfit operation is a “great challenge to the occupation,” which is in reference to a chain of terror attacks that is a response to the number of conflicts between rioters and Israeli police at the Al-Aqsa mosque.

“Al-Qassam Brigades’ announcement of the Salfit operation directly confirms once again that the occupation is tampering with detonators,” Hamadeh continued.

Protesters wave Hamas flags after Friday prayers of the holy month of Ramadan, at the Al Aqsa Mosque Compound in Jerusalem’s Old City, Friday, April 22, 2022. (credit: JAMAL AWAD/FLASH90)Hamas’s military wing took responsibility on Monday for the murder of a 23-year-old security guard that was killed in a terror attack last Friday.

There have been numerous riots at the Temple Mount between Arab rioters and Israeli forces. The area is expected to reopen to Jewish visitors on Thursday, as Israel is marking Independence Day. The site has since been closed to them since April 22.

Hamas spokesperson Abdel Latif Al-Qanou said, similarly to Hamadeh, that Jews entering the site would be a “detonator for new confrontation.”

Tzvi Joffre contributed to this report.