Structure of Al-Aqsa mosque

 Dome:

The original Abd al-Malik dome is no longer visible. The current dome is modelled after the dome of az-Zahir, which was made of wood and was covered with lead enamelwork before being destroyed by fire in 1969. It is now composed of concrete and covered in lead sheeting.

Only a few domes were constructed in front of the mihrab throughout the Umayyad and Abbasid periods; the other two were the Great Mosque of Sousse (715) and the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus (715).T he dome's inside is painted with ornamentation from the 14th century. The paintings, which were destroyed in the 1969 fire and thought to be beyond repair, were totally rebuilt using the trateggio technique, which uses thin vertical lines to separate restored portions from original ones.

Doorway and porch:

the mosque's exterior. The Fatimids built it, and the Crusaders, Ayyubids, and Mamluks afterwards added to it.

According to the Fatimid caliph al-Mustansir Billah's directions, the mosque's front was constructed around 1065 CE. A balustrade made up of arcades and tiny columns served as its cap. The facade was harmed by the Crusaders, but it was rebuilt by the Ayyubids. The facade's tiled covering was one addition.The crusader structures in Jerusalem provided the sculpted, ornamental material used in the facade's arches.

There are fourteen stone arches on the front, the majority of which are Romanesque in design. The Mamluks expanded the arches on the exterior in a same manner. Through the central arch of the front, one enters the mosque.

At the very top of the facade is the porch. The Knights Templar constructed the porch's centre bays during the First Crusade, but Saladin's nephew al-Mu'azzam Isa gave the order to build the porch itself in 1217.

Interior:

45 columns, 33 of which are white marble and 12 of which are stone, support the interior of the mosque. The central aisles' column rows are bulky and short. The proportions of the final four rows are better. There are four different types of column capitals: the ones in the central aisle are large and crudely built, while the ones beneath the dome are of the Corinthian order and made of Italian white marble. The capitals east and west of the dome are also basket-shaped but smaller and better proportioned, while the capitals in the eastern aisle are hefty and of a heavy design. An architectural rave, which consists of beams of roughly squared wood wrapped in a wooden casing, connects the columns and piers.

In addition to many smaller halls to the west and east of the southern half of the structure, the al-Aqsa Mosque features seven aisles of hypostyle naves. The mosque contains 121 stained glass windows from the Fatimid and Abbasid dynasties. In 1924, about one-fourth of them were restored.