Ammon News - Dozens of diehard Jewish settlers stormed the Al-Aqsa Mosque/ Haram Al Sharif plaza in occupied Jerusalem on Wednesday escorted by Israeli police, in the latest breach of one of Islam's holiest sites.

The Islamic Waqf Department, the custodian of the compound, said in a statement that settlers in groups broke into the compound from the Mughrabi Gate and performed prayers and provocations as Israeli police imposed tight restrictions on the entry of Muslim worshippers to the complex, some had their IDs seized at the gates.

In the West Bank, Israeli occupation forces launched search-and-arrest raids across Palestinian towns and villages and rounded up 23 people. The raids took place in Hebron, Al-Bireh, Ramallah, Nablus, and Jenin, the Palestinian Prisoners' Club Association said.

Elsewhere, Jewish settlers set up a new settlement outpost on Palestinian-owned land in the town of Aqraba, southeast of Nablus, pitched up tents and prefabricated homes and raised flags on a slope.

Also as part of stepped up settlement expansion, the so-called Israeli Civil Administration announced a plan to expand Otniel settlement, built on lands of the town of Dahiriya, south of Hebron, including construction of 156 new settler units.

Further south, a group of Jewish settlers, with bulldozers, leveled land in the town of Turmus Aya, northeast of Ramallah, in an attempt to seize the property from Palestinian owners.

It comes amid escalating settler attacks on Palestinians and property across the West Bank amid international silence and disregard for the ongoing breaches of international law by the occupation authority. WAFA