File:Mosque controversy Nazareth.jpg

English: In the late 1990s, the Christian community wanted to make this land a open square, to handle the expected flow of Christian pilgrims (the tourists never came because of the al-Aqsa Intifada). A group of Muslim militants had seized control of the land a couple years earlier (the land is government owned).

Despite its usual practice of reacting to this type of provocation, the Israeli government (in the run of to an election in which several coalition members were courting Arab votes) sided with the Muslim group. Christians protested that the group was following the pattern of Islamic fundamentalists in other countries of seizing land near churches in efforts to intimidate and harass local Christians.

Claiming that the government was trying to create discord among Israel's Arab population, both Yasser Arafat and the Islamic Supreme Council in Jerusalem opposed the plan. Construction was started on the mosque in November 2000, but halted by the Ariel Sharon government in January 2002. The mosque was built in another location, a solution that Saudi Arabia had offered to pay for back in 2000. In May 2003, Israel razed the partially completed mosque.