(ANSAmed) - TEL AVIV, OCTOBER 29 - The Head of State Isaac Herzog today "asked forgiveness" from the Arab minority in Israel for a massacre committed 65 years ago by a military unit in the Arab city of Kfar Kassem (central Israel) in which 49 civilians were killed . "Killing and hitting innocent people - he said, speaking in Arabic, during a commemoration of the astrage - are totally forbidden. This must be said beyond any political conviction. I bow my head - he continued - in front of the memory of the 49 killed and in front of the families.
I ask forgiveness, in my name and in the name of the State of Israel. "The massacre took place on October 29, 1956, on the first day of an Israeli military offensive (Operation Kadesh) in the Sinai desert. A curfew was imposed in several Arab locations, with short notice to prevent riots. Border Guard soldiers then fired on laborers returning to the camps, unaware of the measure imposed at their locality.
Herzog's two predecessors, Shimon Peres and Reuven Rivlin, have also participated in the commemorations in KfarKassem in the past, expressing their contrition for that location. episode. (ANSAmed).