You're listening to the Witness History Podcast on the BBC World Service.

It's 30 years since the Oslo Accords were signed.

This agreement in 1993 aimed to bring about peace between the Israelis and Palestinians.

This week, we're bringing you stories from Israeli and Palestinian history.

Today, we're going back to September 2000,

when the Israeli opposition leader, Ariel Sharon, visited the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in Jerusalem's old city.

His appearance was followed by an upsurge in violence between Palestinians and Israelis.

In 2012, Mike Lanchin spoke to an Israeli and a Palestinian who were there that day.

Mr. Sharon is a provocator. He and Paul, the people who joined him, he came here in order to build up the area.

Al-Aqsa Mosque is an Islamic place. Al-Aqsa is in the Palestinian territory.

For Muslims, the Al-Aqsa Mosque is sacred, but it sits alongside the Temple Mount,

a holy site for Jews, Muslims and Christians.

It's central to the age old dispute over who controls the holy city itself.

But Ariel Sharon claimed that his visit wasn't intended to provoke.

I came here with a message of peace. I came here to the holiest place of the Jewish people to have the feeling

how really to move forward. It was not provocation here, the provocation was only on the other side.

From early that morning, the police had flooded the area in anticipation of trouble.

Effectively closed off the Al-Aqsa Mosque, shutting inside those who'd come to morning prayers.

Khalid Sigari is a Palestinian cameraman who was working for Reuters news agency.

So I went early morning, two hours before Sharon arrived to the Mosque, and I stayed inside the building of the Mosque.

While the tens of security members of Sharon's, of the Israeli security were really scanning and making clearance

that everything is okay and it's very safe for them to get in.

...