Israel Submits Protest to U. N. Security Council on Syrian Aggression

Israel protested today to the Security Council against a “new wave of Syrian aggressions, “which since December has manifested itself in ten serious incidents, costing ten Israeli casualties, including three dead.

The protest, addressed to the President of the Security Council, said the series of recent Syrian aggressions showed signs of having been “planned and premeditated on instructions of responsible authorities” of Syria. In the latest of the incidents, which occurred on Tuesday, Syrian soldiers attacked a group of 20 Israeli policemen in the demilitarized zone east of Dan settlement, killing two and wounding six, Israel stressed.

“The most serious feature of this latest series of Syrian acts of aggression against Israel, ” the Israel letter stated, “is the fact that in most cases members of the regular Syrian Army were involved. In numerous instances the fire came from fortified Syrian army positions and in several instances Syrian soldiers entered Israel territory. The firing was directed against Israel civilians who were engaged in peaceful pursuits such as agricultural work, the tending of sheep and fishing, or against Israel policemen clearing mines which had been placed by Syrians in the demilitarized zone on the Israel side of the international border.”

The letter, submitted to the President of the Security Council by Mordecai Kidron, member of the Israel delegation to the UN, requested the President to circulate the protest among all Council members, but did not ask for a Council meeting. The president of the Council for February will be Arkady R. Sobolev, Soviet delegate.

(In Jerusalem today it was announced that a new appeal had been made by Israel to the United Nations Secretariat asking it to intervene with Cairo for the return of the fishing trawler Doron, a modern, fully equipped 70-ton vessel. The Doron’s crew was released by the Egyptian earlier in the week.)