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PaperclipPerfector  6d ago (text post)   1051 thread views

Transnational Thursday for March 19, 2026

Transnational Thursday is a thread for people to discuss international news, foreign policy or international relations history. Feel free as well to drop in with coverage of countries you’re interested in, talk about ongoing dynamics like the wars in Israel or Ukraine, or even just whatever you’re reading.

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(Hopefully this post, containing only links concerning one current event, is according to The Rules(TM) )

Iranian ballistic missile fragment hitting the old city of Jerusalem, falling roughly 400 yards from the Western Wall and Al-Aqsa.

Not the first time it happened.

Oordinary oops? Final Iranian desperate move to incite Spirit of Jihad(TM)? Israeli false flag, in preparation to finally remove these obstreperous buildings to make space for Third Temple?

Reminder that really spicy times hadn't began yet.

Or, another possibility is when Al-Aqsa gets destroyed for real, nothing really happens. The Ummah, tired of lifetime of fruitless rage, just shrugs their collective shoulders. "We have enough mosques at home".

Mother of all anti-climatic endings ensues.

Just stay calm and keep monitoring the situation.

edit: links linked

I have long wondered whether Israel's Iron Dome, which openly tracks expected impact points and only intercepts high-value rockets, is setup to include Al-Aqsa. I can see arguments for either (maybe even changing over time), but no reason to actually disclose this policy choice.

Given how densely populated the area is, and the inherent imprecision, I think it would be significantly harder to exclude Al-Aqsa than to include it. In other words, even if Israel wanted for Iran to hit Al-Aqsa, allowing it to do it without risking the lives of a lot of civilians would be impossible. And a fragment after interception could still hit it, but it's not predictable or controllable.

Look for example at this picture: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Aqsa_Mosque#/media/File:Jerusalem-2013(2)-Aerial-Temple_Mount-(south_exposure).jpg (the actual mosque, btw, is not the golden dome, it's the square structure with the smaller dome lower in the picture) - there are a lot of buildings close to it, most of which likely don't have protected spaces that can withstand a rocket strike. So while I know of no official policy about it, I am pretty sure the answer is "yes".

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