Al-Aqsa Mosque

Al-Aqsa Mosque ("The Farthest Mosque") is a mosque, or a place where Muslims go to worship, and it is in East Jerusalem/Baitulmaqdis.

History

The mosque was first built in 705 AD. The first mosque was destroyed in an earthquake in 748 AD and had to be built again. We do not know when it was built again, but it was probably in 771 AD, and this mosque was destroyed soon after they finished building it. The third mosque was built around 780 AD. In 1033 AD there was another earthquake, and the mosque had to be built again.^[1]

East Jerusalem was taken over by the Crusaders in 1099. Instead of taking down the mosque, the crusaders used the mosque as a palace. In 1119 it was changed into the headquarters for the Templar Knights.^[2]

Attacks

People have planned to attack the mosque, and some people have actually attacked it. In 1969 Michael Dennis Rohan set the mosque on fire, destroying a lot of the mosque. Some members of the Gush Emunim Underground planned to blow up the mosque, but they never blew it up.^[3]

In September of 2000 Ariel Sharon visited Al-Aqsa, and Palestinians who were at the mosque threw objects at the police force that was with Sharon. In return the police shot rubber bullets at the group of Palestinians. Palestinians said Sharon visited the mosque to make people angry, but Sharon said he had gone there with a message of peace.^[4] This visit is what some believe caused the Second Intifada.^[5]

Name

"Al-Aqsa Masjid" means "the farthest Mosque". The masjid's name comes from a story in the Quran called "The Night Journey". In the story Muhammad goes from Makkah to East Jerusalem, where the Al-Aqsa Masjid is. Then he went up to Heaven (Jannah).^[6]^[7]

Al-Aqsa Mosque Media

Extract of an 1841 British map showing both "Mesjid el-Aksa" and "Jami el-Aksa"
The mosque is situated at the Southern end of the Haram al-Sharif
The mosque along the southern wall of al-Haram al-Sharif
A 19th-century chromolithograph of the mosque's interior. The mosaic designs on the drum of the dome, the pendentives, and the archway in front of the mihrab date from the mid-11th-century Fatimid reconstruction
Caliph al-Zahir's inscription above the mihrab
The doors of the Saladin Minbar, early 1900s. The minbar was built on Nur al-Din's orders, but installed by Saladin
Gerusalemme, la moschea "Masjid Al-Aqsa", fra il 1890 e il 1900.
The dome in 1982, covered in aluminum and visibly silver, following the 1969 fire, rather than the original grey lead
The silver-colored dome consists of lead sheeting
The facade of the mosque. It was constructed by the Fatimids, then expanded by the Crusaders, the Ayyubids and the Mamluks