The Arab League on Wednesday condemned a raid by Israeli forces on the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem. "The extremist approaches that control the policy of the Israeli government will lead to widespread confrontations with the Palestinians if they are not put to an end," League Secretary General Ahmed Aboul Gheit said in a statement. Israeli police stormed into the mosque early Wednesday, firing stun grenades at Palestinian youths who hurled firecrackers at them in a burst of violence during a sensitive holiday season. Palestinian militants in Gaza responded with rocket fire on southern Israel, prompting repeated Israeli airstrikes. The fighting, coming as Muslims mark the holiday month of Ramadan and Jews prepare to begin the Passover festival on Wednesday evening, raised fears of a wider conflagration. Similar clashes two years ago erupted into a bloody 11-day war between Israel and the ruling Hamas group in Gaza. The official Palestinian news agency Wafa said that dozens of worshippers who were spending the night praying were injured in the police raid. The Israeli military said one soldier was shot in a separate incident in the occupied West Bank. The mosque sits on a sensitive hilltop compound holy to both Jews and Muslims. Al-Aqsa is the third-holiest site in Islam and is typically packed with worshippers during Ramadan. Overnight, the scene of festive holiday-makers picnicking and praying at the holy site transformed into one of violence, as Israeli police stormed into the mosque, firing tear gas and stun grenades that shattered stained-glass windows and fiercely beating worshippers with clubs and rifle butts, witnesses said. The spot, known to Jews as the Temple Mount, is also the holiest site in Judaism, revered as the location of the biblical Jewish temples. The conflicting claims fuel constant tensions that have spilled over to violence numerous times in the past. Since Ramadan began March 22, scores of Muslim worshippers have been trying to stay overnight in the mosque, a practice that is typically permitted only during the last 10 days of the monthlong holiday. Israeli police have entered nightly to evict the worshippers, stirring tensions with young Palestinians who demand to pray at the holy site until dawn. Tensions over control of the holy site have been heightened by calls from Jewish ultranationalists to carry out a ritual slaughter of a goat in the compound, imitating the ancient ritual sacrifice executed on Passover in biblical times. Israel bars ritual slaughters on the site, but calls by Jewish extremists to revive the practice, including offers of cash rewards to anyone who even attempts to bring an animal into the compound, have amplified fears among Muslims that Israel is plotting to take over the site. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said he is committed to preserving the status quo at the compound. After some 80,000 worshippers attended evening prayers at the mosque on Tuesday, hundreds of Palestinians barricaded themselves inside the mosque overnight to pray. Worshippers said that after they refused to leave, Israeli police moved into the mosque, descending on Palestinians with batons. Israeli police said they moved in after “several law-breaking youths and masked agitators” brought fireworks, sticks and stones and barricaded themselves into the mosque. Police said the youths chanted violent slogans and locked the front doors.