KUWAIT CITY, Sept 18: Kuwait’s Foreign Ministry strongly denounced the storming of Al-Aqsa Mosque in the holy city of Jerusalem by Jewish extremists under the protection of Israeli occupation police. The incursion is a flagrant violation of international laws and norms, the Ministry said in a press release on Sunday. The Ministry decried the persistence of the Israeli occupation authorities in such provocative acts, which target Muslim worshippers, urging the international community to shoulder its responsibility for preventing the repeated Israeli aggression, providing protection to Al-Aqsa Mosque, and ensuring the Muslim worshippers’ freedom of belief.

Meanwhile, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia strongly denounced the storming of Al- Aqsa Mosque by Jewish extremists under the protection of the Israeli occupation forces. The incursion is a flagrant violation of the international laws and norms, and an act of provocation against Muslims, the Ministry said in a press release on Sunday. The Ministry held the Israeli occupation forces accountable for such provocations, urging the international community to shoulder its responsibility for halting the Israeli escalation, providing protection for civilians in the holy city of Jerusalem, and putting an end to the conflict. The European Union stressed the need to continue funding Palestinian state buildings, as well as to ensure adequate funding for UN organizations, such as the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA).

The UN organizations require urgent new financial support to continue delivering essential services to Palestinians and Palestinian refugees, expressed EU High Representative Josep Borrell. Borrell co-hosted the International Peace Institute’s (IPI) annual dinner with Qatari Prime Minister and Foreign Minister, Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, and IPI President Zeid Ra’ad Al-Hussein on Sunday in New York at the sidelines of UNGA. According to a statement issued by Borrell’s office in Brussels, the discussion focused on the situation in the wider Middle East and in particular the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Participants discussed what the international community could do to ease the tensions; break the negative cycle of violence; bring the parties closer; and restore a political horizon. Borrell reiterated the necessity to stop unilateral actions that undermine the two-state solution, and called on everyone to condemn terrorism, while also reaffirming the EU’s support to the solution. He also underlined the importance of the Palestinian authority strengthening its legitimacy via holding national elections and proceeding with intra-Palestinian reconciliation.