Jordan on Wednesday recalled its ambassador to Israel in protest against what it described as Israeli "violations" in Jerusalem and its holy sites, the first time it has done so since the countries made peace in 1994, Jordanian officials said.

Israel last week closed for a day the compound housing the Al-Aqsa mosque, Islam's third holiest site, amid increasing Israeli-Palestinian violence around it. The move infuriated Jordanian King Abdullah, who is custodian of the sacred compound that also houses the Dome of the Rock mosque.

The decision to recall the ambassador was taken "in protest at the increasing and unprecedented Israeli escalation in the Noble Sanctuary, and the repeated Israeli violations of Jerusalem", Jordan's Petra news agency said.

The Noble Sanctuary is the Islamic name for the compound housing the Al-Aqsa mosque and the Dome of the Rock. The site in Jerusalem's walled Old City is known to Jews as the Temple Mount and is the holiest place in Judaism.

Palestinians and Israeli police have been clashing on a daily basis in the streets of East Jerusalem and the Old City compound over the past few weeks. Jordan also plans to lodge a formal complaint in the U.N. Security Council about Israeli actions in Jerusalem, a Jordanian government spokesman said.

Israel shut the compound for one day last Thursday following an attack on a far-right Israeli-American activist who was shot and seriously wounded after speaking out against a ban on Jews praying at the site.