MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Golan Heights: Uruguayan peacekeepers near line of fire

Violence is spiraling in the Middle East

Uruguay's Army Sunday reported that its peacekeeping troops in the Golan Heights were in good shape after missile attacks were recorded Saturday in the area they are patrolling. However, the group's mission was temporarily suspended.

”Last night a missile attack occurred between the forces, in the Golan Heights area where the UNDOF (United Nations Disengagement Observer Force) mission is taking place,“ the Uruguayan Army said in a statement.

After rockets were fired this Saturday from Syria towards Israel and the impacts could be heard from the Uruguayan Army's camp, a security alert was issued and the activities of the forces were temporarily suspended, while remaining at their bases, it was explained.

”All Uruguayan personnel are in good health and are waiting for the situation to return to normal,“ the South American country's Army also said.

Three rockets were fired Saturday from Syria into Israel, the Israeli army reported, following similar shots fired in recent days from Lebanon, in a spiral of violence in the Middle East. Warning sirens were triggered in the area.

One of the rockets ”fell in a wasteland south of the Golan Heights”, a territory annexed by Israel, the military statement said.

In 1967, Israel occupied and annexed part of the Golan Heights, a strategic region bordering Lebanon and Syria.

Saturday's missile launches came two days after the firing of some 30 rockets from Lebanon, attributed to Palestinian organizations and representing the largest escalation on the Israeli-Lebanese border since 2006.

The Israeli army responded to these rockets with bombardments in the Palestinian enclave of Gaza and southern Lebanon.

This escalation of violence comes in a week in which the incursion by Israeli forces into Jerusalem's Al Aqsa Mosque, Islam's third holiest site, at the height of the Muslim Ramadan celebrations, sent shockwaves through the Arab world.

A car bombing killed an Italian man in Tel Aviv on Friday and wounded seven others. Two Israeli-British nuns were also killed on the same day in the West Bank.