The project is to restore an access ramp near the mosque compound, a flashpoint site in Jerusalem’s Old City revered by Muslims and Jews and the epicenter of the 2000 Palestinian uprising.

The project was halted in February following furious protests by local Muslim leaders, who said the project threatened the foundations of the esplanade, considered Islam’s third holiest site.

For Jews, the esplanade was built on the site of the Second Temple that was destroyed by the Romans in 70 AD and is the location of Judaism’s holiest site.

The decision to resume the project was taken by a ministerial committee led by Israel’s Prime Minister Ehud Olmert on November 29, two days after he relaunched peace talks with Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas at a conference in the United States, according to the website (www.pmo.gov.il.)

The committee has ordered Israel’s antiquities authority ‘to restart these works as soon as possible, in total transparency and in cooperation with all the official bodies concerned,’ the website said.

The Jerusalem regional planning committee must first approve plans for the project, and a spokeswoman for the antiquities authority told AFP that ‘for the moment (it) has not received new directions concerning these works.’

On February 6, Israel started excavation work on a pathway leading from the Western Wall to the mosque compound. It says the work is a prerequisite for replacing an access ramp damaged by an earthquake and a snowstorm in 2004.

Israel insists the archaeological work poses no risk to the compound, and in March the UN’s cultural agency said a mission had found no evidence the work had damaged the foundations of the holy sites.

UNESCO nevetheless urged Israel to halt the excavations, asking that it clearly define the final design of the intended work and insisting that the process should be supervised by a team of international experts.