United Nations Body Reports on Israel’s Retaliatory Attack on Jordan

Seventeen Jordanians are known to be dead and more are buried in the debris of a Jordan police post blasted in an Israeli attack after midnight this morning, a United Nations communique on the incident said late today. The police station, the communique, said, was one kilometre inside Jordan.

Twelve of the known dead were killed at the police post and the other five died when the Israelis ambushed Jordanian reinforcements, the UN communique said. The Israelis blew up a school nearly a mile northwest of the police post, but there were no casualties, the UN added. Efforts are being made to recover the bodies and UN observers are continuing their investigation, the communique stated.

“The attack on the police post and school and the related ambush shortly after midnight appear as an act of retaliation such as has been repeatedly condemned by the Security Council,” the communique said. Maj. Gen. E. L. M. Burns, UN truce chief, appealed to both sides to end this tragic series of events and observe the cease fire.

An earlier UN communique dealt with Monday’s attack by Jordanian troops on Israeli soldiers, in which six Israelis were killed. The communique said that UN observers had concluded their investigation and the incident would be considered at tomorrow’s meeting of the Israel-Jordan Mixed Armistice Commission. “If it is shown that the Jordanians fired first and that no Israelis crossed the demarcation lines. Jordan will bear heavy responsibility,” the communique said.

It cited conflicting testimony by the two sides. According to the Jordanians, a large number of Israeli soldiers approached the demarcation lines and six were killed in an exchange of fire begun by the Israelis who had crossed the line. The Israeli version, the UN communique said, was that 30 soldiers were engaged in map reading exercises when they were fired on, and that the bodies of six were dragged across the border by the Jordanians.