TEL AVIV – Saudi Arabia and Israel are holding secret negotiations to allow Saudi representatives to join the Waqf Islamic council that controls the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, according to a report Monday by the Israel Hayom daily.
The talks are being mediated by the U.S., the report said, and are taking place against the backdrop of President Donald Trump’s peace proposal for solving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and Israel’s plan to annex large tracts of the West Bank and the Jordan Valley.
“These are sensitive and secret discussions conducted with ambiguity and low intensity with a small team of diplomats and senior security officials from Israel, the U.S. and Saudi Arabia as park of negotiations to progress the Deal of the Century,” senior Saudi diplomats told the newspaper.
Jordan, which administers the Waqf, has loosened its stance of excluding non-Jordanians from the council, and in recent months has appointed Palestinian representatives who in turn have allowed the Turkish government to establish a presence at the holy site by funding projects to the tune of tens of millions of dollars, the report said.
Amman informed Washington and Jerusalem that Saudi representatives would be allowed to join the Waqf under specific conditions.
The Gulf kingdom, in return, would contribute millions of dollars to Islamic foundations operating in east Jerusalem and the Temple Mount. Saudi Arabia would also exert pressure to remove the Turkish organizations from the flashpoint site, the report said.
The reason for the latter demand is because Turkey’s presence has undermined Jordan’s status on the holy site, a senior Arab diplomat told the paper.
“If the Jordanians allow the Turks to operate unhindered at the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, within a matter of years their special status in charge of the Waqf and Muslim holy sites would be relegated to being strictly ‘on paper.’ They need the Saudi’s money and influence to block [Turkish President Recep Tayyip] Erdogan,” the diplomat said.
“Israel and the US also have an interest here because they want Saudi support for the US peace plan and Israeli annexation initiative, and because Saudi Arabia can ensure support from Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates.”
He added it was still too early to determine whether the talks would amount to anything.
“The intention is for the Saudi representatives to function strictly as observers, so as not to detract from the Jordanians’ exclusive status,” he said.
The Temple Mount reopened on Sunday after almost 3 months of closure as a result of the coronavirus outbreak.
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