Planned Temple Mount Ascent

Depiction of Levites Carrying the Ark of the Covenant

An ascent of the Temple Mount area in Jerusalem is planned for July, 30, 2009:

Hundreds planning Temple Mount ascent

Jerusalem Post – July 23, 2009

Hundreds of right-wing activists are intending to attempt to march up to the Temple Mount next Thursday morning, Tisha Be’Av, in protest of the US demand to cease construction in east Jerusalem.

March organizer Gershon Salomon told the Jerusalem Post that as opposed to previous years when only a few dozen participants at most tried to go up to the mount, this year he was hoping for hundreds to protest the “US pressure to stop settlement activity, and east Jerusalem construction in particular, and also the apparent weakness of our leaders,” which he said he feared would lead to a “division of Jerusalem and the loss of the Temple Mount.”

“We’re concerned that in the end, the Temple Mount will be part of a Palestinian state, with US backing,” he told the Post. “We will say to [US President Barack] Obama, ‘Get your hands off Jerusalem and the land of Israel!”

He said flyers about the protest contained the message that “we’ll let Barack Hussein Obama and Binyamin Netanyahu know that we’re not moving from here,” as well as the words: “Go to the Bible to find out to whom this land belongs!”

Salomon expressed hope that unlike previous years, this time the security forces would allow the group to ascend the mount.

“What a tragedy that police have made it off limits to Jews,” he lamented, “There is no [Israeli] flag, no talit, no siddur – and our requests to hold a reading of the Scroll of Lamentations there on Tisha Be’av were turned down.”

…Salomon said that the demonstration was set to begin at the gates of the Temple Mount at 11:30 on that morinng of Tisha Be’Av (Thursday), while the attempted ascent would begin at approximately 1:30 p.m…http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1248277871142&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

Jluy 30th is is the 9th of Ab (Tisha B’Ab). It primarily commemorates the destruction of the first and second Temples, both of which were destroyed on the ninth of Av (the first by the Babylonians in 586 B.C.E.; the second by the Romans in 70 A.D.).

Whether or not this ascent happens (and it has not succeeded in the past), the reality is that it is not required for the Jews to have a temple before Jesus returns.

But it is interesting that part of the reason for this hoped for massive march is to send a message to US President Obama. Just the discussion of the reason may send a message to the rest of the world that Israel is not likely to simply give up its claims to the Temple Mount area.

Bible prophecy indicates that certain events will involve that area.

Two articles of possibly related interest may include:

Why is a Jewish Temple in Jerusalem Not Required? Although people like Timothy LaHaye teach a third Jewish temple is required, who is ‘the temple of God” in the New Testament? What does the Bible teach about the temple in the end-times?
Who is the King of the North? Is there one? Do biblical and Roman Catholic prophecies point to the same leader? Should he be followed? Who will be the King of the North discussed in Daniel 11? Is a nuclear attack prophesied to happen to the English-speaking peoples of the United States, Great Britain, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand? When do the 1335 days, 1290 days, and 1260 days (the time, times, and half a time) of Daniel 12 begin? When does the Bible show that economic collapse will affect the United States?