Word: beisan
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...intensive bombing, including one 14-hour dawn-to-dusk raid, or that they shot down three Egyptian planes to bring their kills since 1967 to 101 (v. losses of nine). Near the Jordan border, Arab guerrillas fired Soviet-supplied, 220-mm. Katyusha rockets into the dusty town of Beisan on three occasions, killing three ten-year-old girls and wounding 36 people, mostly children. For the first time since 1948, rockets fell on Tiberias, a resort on the Sea of Galilee, killing two and wounding four...
...extent of Israel's blame for its "punitive invasion" of Jordan two weeks ago, both sides were rolling up their sleeves for another battle. Israel, ever more touchy about the incursions of Arab commandos across the River Jor dan, massed troops, tanks and artillery in the Beisan valley south of the Sea of Galilee awaiting an excuse to renew the offensive. Jordan, cheered beyond measure by the fact that its troops had knocked out a dozen Israeli tanks, replied in kind. It evacuated civilians from its own Beisan valley villages, moved in well-trained guerrillas and its Arab Legion...
...long in coming. The Israelis got the provocation they were looking for when a tractor pulling a cartload of kibbutzniks ran over a terrorist mine in the soggy underbrush of a Beisan valley banana plantation. Four men were killed, including the 53-year-old founder of the kibbutz, and four others wounded. Three hours later, the Israeli army opened up with light machine-gun fire on the Jordanian side of the valley. The Jordanians fired back, and the battle was on. Israeli artillery pounded an evacuated village, and Jordanian 155-mm. Long Toms zeroed in on seven kibbutzim...
Cinemascope Production. Israeli farmers got a panoramic view of the battle from slit trenches near the river. They called it "a Cinemascope production." The broad Beisan valley, green with ripening winter crops and blossoming trees, was painted with countless columns of rising black smoke. Israeli planes dive-bombed Jordanian positions, then wheeled west into the sun to confound the aim of Arab anti aircraft gunners. The village of Tel el-Arbain, an El Fatah commando base, was in flames. A Jordanian oil dump near the river burned an ominous red far into the night...
Meantime, the warring races continued to bedevil one another. In the preponderantly Arab city of Jaffa, Arabs set fire to a few Jewish shops. Thereupon the fire, backed by a strong wind, turned and burned a number of Arab homes. Jews from the Arab towns of Hebron, Acre and Beisan were evacuated to nearby Jewish communities. All-Jewish Tel Aviv was ringed with barbed wire to keep out bloodthirsty Arabs. In terrorist murders and police fire, the Jewish dead last week reached 18; the Arab, twelve...