A Palestinian gunman infiltrated the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights from Syria and fired on Israeli troops today in a rare flare-up on the border that the Jewish state blamed on Damascus.
The army said it captured the lone attacker, a 21-year-old militant belonging to Fatah, the Palestinians' ruling faction, and that he told interrogators he had planned to abduct an Israeli soldier and take him back to Syria.
No casualties were reported, but media reports said the army had launched an inquiry into how the gunman managed to breach defences along the heavily fortified border.
Israel, which recently accused Syria of trying to disrupt an Israeli-Palestinian truce, called the incident a "grave violation" of UN-brokered security arrangements set up in the area after the 1973 Middle East war.
"The Syrians should not be allowing armed terrorists to cross the border," an Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman said. "We demand ... that the agreement be strictly upheld."