Israeli soldiers inspect the border fence on May 16, 2011 after protesters crossed from Syria into the Israeli-annexed Golan Heights near the Druze town of Majdal Shams the previous day during a mass protest in solidarity with the Palestinians over the 1948 creation of the Jewish state known in Arabic as the "Nakba" or "Catastrophe." The incident has raised tensions between Damascus and the Jewish state after Israeli gunfire killed two protesters and wounded dozens.
MAJDAL SHAMS: Hundreds of police fanned out across the Golan Heights on Monday in search of refugees who crossed over from Syria in some of the bloodiest violence in years along Israel’s borders.
Twelve people were killed and around 300 others were injured on Sunday when Israeli troops fired on thousands of people along the Syrian and Lebanese borders, as well as in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank.
The protests came as Palestinians in the territories and in the neighbouring countries staged massive protests to mark the anniversary of Israel’s founding in 1948, in an event known in Arabic as the “nakba” or “catastrophe.” The Israeli army and police remained on high alert with hundreds of police working through the night in the Golan Heights town of Majdal Shams to seek out any protesters who had not returned to Syria.
“Throughout the night, police have been searching house-to-house for suspects who could still be in Majdal Shams,” spokesman Micky Rosenfeld told AFP, saying police had detained a 34-year-old Syrian, who was trying to leave the town in a taxi driven by a Palestinian from east Jerusalem.
Brigadier General Yoav Mordechai told army radio that the military remained “in a state of high alert in the north, the south and the centre,” and defence chiefs also extended a 24-hour lockdown on the occupied Palestinian territories which had been due to end at midnight on Sunday.
The border breach in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights was one of the worst incidents of violence there since a 1974 truce accord, while the clashes along the Lebanese border marked the bloodiest confrontation since the 2006 war between the two neighbours.
Most of the victims were in Lebanon, where 10 people were killed and 110 injured when Israeli troops opened fire on people trying to scale the border fence.
Palestinian camps across Lebanon declared a day of mourning, with shops observing a general strike ahead of the funerals for the 10 victims, which were to take place in four refugee camps later on Monday.
And Hassan Nasrallah, head of the Lebanese Shiite militia group Hezbollah praised the protesters’ “courage” saying they had “given the nakba new meaning.” Lebanon has filed a complaint with the United Nations, urging it to make Israel “halt its aggression and provocation” while Syria warned that the Jewish state would bear full responsibility for its “criminal” actions.
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon expressed deep concern over the violence and urged all sides to show the “utmost responsibility” to avoid new hostilities, a spokesman said.
Filippo Grandi, head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) also condemned the bloodshed, saying it proved the need for a solution to the plight of the refugees, who now number 4.8 million.
“I deplore the deaths of Palestine refugees in Lebanon, the occupied Golan Heights and the occupied Palestinian territory,” he said in a statement, echoing Ban’s call for all parties to “show restraint and ensure that civilians are not killed or injured.”But Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the Jewish state was “determined” to defend its borders against protestors bent on denying Israel’s right to exist.
As well as the Lebanese incident, hundreds of protesters from Syria broke through the Israeli border and entered the occupied Golan Heights, prompting a volley of fire which left at least two people dead, medics said, while the army said “dozens” had been injured.
And along Gaza’s northern border with Israel, 125 people were injured, five of them seriously, when troops opened fired as more than 1,000 Palestinians marched on the Erez crossing.
Elsewhere, 29 others were injured in clashes in the West Bank and annexed east Jerusalem.
The army said said it had “fired selectively” has “hundreds of Syrian rioters” had crossed onto the Israeli side, saying it had done the same along the Lebanese border in order to warn off protesters trying to breach the fence.
Thirteen soldiers were also injured in the two incidents, it said.
In Israel, a 22-year-old Arab Israeli truck driver was due in court after he ploughed into 12 cars and a bus on Sunday, killing one, in what police believe was a deliberate attack.
More than 760,000 Palestinians — estimated today to number 4.8 million with their descendants — were pushed into exile or driven out of their homes in the conflict that accompanied the Jewish state’s foundation.