(BIN) – While the US is rocked by anti-racism protests, a situation exists in Jerusalem that is even more racist than the US before the civil rights movement. The water fountains on the Temple Mount were reserved for the exclusive use of Muslims while Jews were not permitted to drink at all.

But thanks to a group of determined Jews, that situation is slowly changing. Following Israel’s capture of the Temple Mount in the 1967 Six-Day War, the Israeli government handed day-to-day control of the area to the Muslim Waqf religious authorities, overseen by the Jordanian government. Israel retains security control of the area.

The conditions established at the time gave the exclusive right to pray at the site to the Muslims.. Jews were prohibited from bringing any religious items or books onto the Temple Mount.  In addition to prayer, Jews were prohibited from drinking at the site and, as a  result, prohibited from using the water fountain in the Temple Mount Compound.

For many, this prohibition was disturbingly reminiscent of the racist policy of ‘separate but equal’ in the pre-Jim Crow days in the southern US. But the situation on the Temple Mount was even more egregious as Jim Crow allowed for separate water fountains for blacks whereas on the Temple Mount, there were no fountains designated for use by Jews. READ MORE