Masjid Umar bin al Khattabؓ | Palestine | مسجد عمر بن الخطابؓ
مسجد عمر بن الخطابؓ
The Ayyubid Mosque of Omar (Arabic: مسجد عمر بن الخطاب) is an Islamic place of worship inside the Old City of Jerusalem. It is located opposite the southern courtyard of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, in the Muristan area of the Christian Quarter. The mosque is not open to tourists, and can be accessed only for praying۔
According to local tradition, after the Siege of Jerusalem in 637 by the Rashidun army under the command of Abu Ubaidah ibn al-Jarrah, Patriarch Sophronius refused to surrender except to the Caliph Omar (579-644) himself. Omar travelled to Jerusalem and accepted the surrender. He then approached the Church of the Holy Sepulchre and Patriarch Sophronius invited the Caliph to pray inside the church, but Omar declined so as not to set a precedent and thereby endanger the church’s status as a Christian site. Instead he prayed outside, on the steps east of the church. The Mosque of Omar was later built at that site, as evidenced by a stone plate with a Kufic inscription found in 1897 in the area of the eastern or outer atrium of the Constantinian (4th-century) Church of the Holy Sepulchre, defining this area as a mosque.
The current structure was built in its current shape by the Ayyubid Sultan Al-Afdal ibn Salah ad-Din in 1193 to commemorate the prayer of the caliph Omar۔