United Nations truce observers were today investigating Israeli complaints of renewed and intensified Egyptian attacks on Israeli military patrols in the Gaza strip area. Israel has requested an emergency meeting of the Israel-Egyptian Mixed Armistice Commission.
The attacks reached a high point yesterday and today, with five incidents in the Beeri area and an attack on a military vehicle. There have been 16 such attacks since April 6, an Israeli military spokesman revealed, explaining that the shootings are a device to cover Arab peasants who cross into Israeli territory and illegally harvest crops.
The attack on the car, which was moving along the Meffalsim Road when it came under fire, necessitated heavy return fire from an Israeli position before the Egyptians quit. The car was hit and an Israeli patrol which went to the rescue of its occupants was pinned down by Egyptian fire. To relieve the patrol, an Israeli unit directed heavy fire on the Egyptian positions.
Saturday, an Egyptian soldier, member of a unit which crossed into Israel in the Gaza strip area, was killed in an exchange of fire with an Israeli military patrol. The Egyptian unit crossed the border near Kibbutz Kissufim to give cover to Arabs illegally harvesting crops on Israeli territory.
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