Abul Gheit requests clarifications about Israeli minister's statment on Al-Aqsa Mosque

Egypt's Foreign Minister Ahmad Abul-Gheit asked the Egyptian embassy in Tel Aviv to get clarifications from the Israeli officials on statements by an Israeli Minister on possible attacks on Al-Aqsa Mosque.

Abul-Gheit underlined Monday the sanctity of Islamic and Christian shrines in Al-Quds (Jerusalem) and the occupied Palestinian territories. Abul-Gheit is concerned about recent warnings made by an Israeli Minister, who said that extremist Jews might be plotting a deadly attack on Al-Aqsa Mosque, an official source at the Foreign Ministry said.

On Saturday, Israeli Public Security Minister Tzachi Hanegbi said that the threat level against Al-Aqsa Mosque, Islam's third holiest place, has risen in recent months and weeks "more than at any time in the past. "We sense that the level of threat to the Temple Mount (the Jewish name of Al-Aqsa Mosque) is surging from the standpoint of extreme and fanatic Jewish elements carrying out a terrorist attack in order to reshuffle the cards to serve as a catalyst to a change in the entire political initiative," he told Israel's Channel Two "Meet the Press" program.

"There is no information about specific individuals, because the Shin Bet and police would not let them continue (with their plot)," he argued.

"But there are troubling indications of purposeful thinking, and not detached philosophy. There is a danger that (extremists) would make use of the most explosive site, in the hope that a chain reaction would bring about the destruction of the peace process." Hanegbi added.