8 May 2009

ISTANBUL, (PIC)-- Syria and Turkey commenced joint military exercises on the common borders on Monday described as the first of their kind between the two countries, a press release by the Turkish chief of staff said.

It said that the three-day maneuvers would start on Monday and end on Wednesday in a bid to boost friendship, cooperation and trust between the two countries' ground forces in addition to upgrading border forces' potential of working and training together.

The Turkish announcement was met with apprehension on the part of Israel, as its war minister Ehud Barak described the joint maneuvers as a "worrisome development ".

Israeli press sources pointed out that the Turkish army uses Israeli weaponry including drones and observation and control equipment.

The Syrian chief of staff Hassan Turkmani started on Sunday a five-day visit to Turkey during which he is to meet with his Turkish counterpart and other military officials of the countries participating in the International Defense Industry Fair (IDEF'09).

Aqsa foundation unveils Israeli plan to besiege Aqsa with dozens of synagogues

Meanwhile, the Aqsa foundation for endowment and heritage revealed Tuesday an Israeli scheme to encircle the Aqsa Mosque with more than 50 synagogues and dozens of Israeli security and military centers as a prelude to splitting the Aqsa Mosque between Muslims and Jews and then building the alleged temple.

In a news conference held at the Ambassador hotel in occupied Jerusalem, the Aqsa foundation said that it monitored and documented dozens of synagogues and areas prepared to be settlement outposts to surround the Aqsa Mosque as soon as possible.

The foundation presented a documentary film entitled "Synagogues besieging the Aqsa Mosque" showing live pictures and testimonies of a number of citizens and researchers who disclosed the truth of settlement schemes in the Old City and the area around the Mosque.

For his part, Sheikh Ra'ed Salah, the head of the Islamic Movement in the 1948 occupied lands, called on the Islamic and Arab Nation to mark the seventh of June, the day of Jerusalem's fall in 1967, as an occasion to support the occupied city of Jerusalem and the Aqsa Mosque.

Sheikh Salah affirmed that the Israeli occupation authority seeks to abolish any Muslim, Arab or Palestinian sovereignty over the Aqsa Mosque and thus tries to paralyze the maintenance of the Aqsa Mosque and impose its presence by armed force.

The Islamic Movement head pointed out that all the synagogues were built on Islamically-endowed (Waqf) lands and real estate and at the expense of the Arab and Muslim heritage.

He also noted that the IOA erected a large candlestick in the Buraq plaza as a prelude to move it into the Aqsa Mosque, adding that there is an Israeli plan to establish an education center for Torah in the same plaza.

For his part, father Attalla Hanna, Archbishop of the Sebaste Roman Orthodox Church, said the building of synagogues aimed to capture the holy city and uproot it from its Arab, Muslim and Christian origins.

Father Hanna underlined that any act against the Aqsa Mosque and Muslim holy sites in Jerusalem is considered an assault on the Resurrection Church and the Christian holy shrines.