Jerusalem’s Next Crisis Is a Hiring Decision |
Last Friday a Turkish worshipper tried to enter the Al Aqsa compound for prayers. An officer stopped him and said, in English, “Turkish, it’s closed, okay?” He walked to a second gate, where officers shook their heads once he told them where he was from and sent him away until the next prayer. Israel Police said this week that the rules permit Turkish citizens to pray there, and that the episode is under review.
That sequence describes how the most sensitive thirty-five acres in the Middle East are actually governed. Cabinet decisions and court rulings set the written rules. An officer standing at a gate decides what happens. When those two diverge, the officer wins, and the world reads the outcome as Israeli policy.
Which is why the composition of the police unit at those gates deserves far more attention than it gets in an election season.
The Temple Mount Unit polices the compound, built into a dedicated force of some two hundred officers after 2017. Its deputy commander, Daniel Lirach, has recruited for it through WhatsApp groups linked to West Bank settlers, inviting anyone who wants to help implement sovereignty to contact him directly. He and the unit commander, Guy Tal, filmed recruitment videos with rabbis of the religious Zionist movement,........