Signifikannya sebuah masjid

In The Name of Allah, the Most Beneficient, the Most Merciful

"Glorified be He Who took His servant (Muhammad) for a journey by night
from Al-Masjid Al Haram (at Mecca) to the Al-Aqsa Mosque (in
Jerusalem), the neighborhood whereof We have blessed, in order that We
might show him some of Our signs. Verily, He is the All-Hearer, the
All-Seer. The Qur'an 17:1.

With these eternal verses, Allah (God), stated in the heart of
the Muslim scripture, the Qur'an, the never diminishing significance
of Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem to Islam and Muslims. Al-Aqsa, right in
the heart of the Muslim world, is to where our prophet Muhammad (peace
and blessings be unto him) journeyed at night in a miraculous manner
from the city of Mecca, where his call to Islam (submission to God)
was still in its earliest stages. At Al-Aqsa Mosque, he led all of the
prophets of Allah that came before him in prayer and then ascended to
heaven to receive Allah's command to the Muslims to pray five times a
day.

Eversince, Al-Aqsa Mosque and the city of Jerusalem have been very
special to Muslims all over the world. They pray for it and long to
pray in it. And today, with Al-Aqsa being under the Israeli occupation
for thirty years, all Muslims pray for its liberation and for the
freedom of their Palestinian brothers, who have become the soldiers at
the front line of the battle to redeem Al-Aqsa.

Occupation, burning, successive agression, closure and martyr after
martyr have become Al-Aqsa'a story in the last thirty years. Al-Aqsa
is really a deep wound right in the heart of the Muslim world. In
today's unfair reality and materialistic world, Al-Aqsa has become a
symbol of the undesired existence of the trouble-making Palestinians,
Arabs and Muslims (so they say!).

No wonder then, that when the dream of a historical parasite of
opening a tunnel to undermine the foundation of Al-Aqsa Mosque finds
its way to reality, Palestinians of all ages and all beliefs spring to
the rescue. They are Muslim Palestinians defending their very basic
right of existence. Some are Christian Palestinians, also, fighting
for the Muslim shrine. Al-Aqsa is more than a building with historical
and religious significance, it is an idea, a creed even, that we all
have to stand up for what is right and true.

Muslims love Al-Aqsa, pray for it, fight for it and die for it
because, as they see it, they are fighting for the promise of a new
and higher reality. A reality of peace, justice and mutual
respect. This promised reality is not an imaginary one. It did exist
when the Muslims liberated Al-Aqsa from the European Crusaders,
allowing them to evacuate Jerusalem peacefully with their belongings
and families. This was the Muslims' response to the brutality of the
Crusaders when they massacred the Arab inhabitants of Jerusalem,
Muslims and Christians alike.

It is in this spirit of a higher reality, that we can understand why
Palestinian soldiers were carrying a wounded Israeli soldier, and were
trying to get him to the closest medical team. This was their response
to the brutality of the Israeli military machine, which did not
hesitate to deploy helicopters against unarmed civilians, trying to
kill them and to kill their dream, of freeing Al-Aqsa Mosque.

We will continue to believe in Islam's message and its symbol,
Al-Aqsa. We can see our promised reality of peace and justice to all,
in the eyes of the innocent Palestinian children, as they die for
Al-Aqsa Mosque.

Idris El Bakri
Jerusalem, Palestine
Muslim Student Association
Brigham Young University

Ya Allah..
Sejahterakanlah qiblat pertama umat Islam

Amin