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by Saed Bannoura - IMEMC & Agencies

Israeli sources reported Friday that a group of extremist Israeli settlers broke into an Israeli military base in the West Bank and wrote graffiti against the army before the soldiers managed to apprehend nine of them.

Israeli paper, Maariv, reported that several settlers arrived at the base in order to protest against the army, and that 10 of them managed to infiltrate into the base before the army managed to apprehend nine. The arrested settlers were moved to an interrogation facility.

Two months ago, extremist settlers infiltrated into the same military base and wrote graffiti against the army.

On December 12, 2011, a group of extremist Israeli settlers of the Hilltop Youth settler movement infiltrated into an Israeli military base near the northern West Bank city of Qalqilia, sabotaged property and vehicles, and hurled stones at the soldiers, wounding a senior officer.

Israeli sources reported that Lieutenant Ran Kahana was mildly wounded after being hit in the head by a stone hurled by one of the settlers. The army chased the infiltrators but did not make any arrests.

The settlers also blocked a main road in the area and hurled stones at Palestinian cars causing damage to a number of vehicles.

Also on Monday December 12, the Israeli Police apprehended 17 extremist settlers who barricaded themselves at the site of the baptism of Jesus in the Jordan River.

They settlers hung banners with photos of the right-wing Jewish leader Ze'ev Jabotinsky, who called for the "Jewish state to expand beyond the Jordan River into the state of Jordan and all the way to Iraq.”

Israeli Yedioth Aharonoth reported then that the settlers entered a closed military zone behind the border fence with Jordan, and barracked themselves in the site, very close to where Jordanian soldiers are stationed.

The site, 10 kilometers away from the West Bank city of Jericho, is one the most sacred sites for Christians after the Nativity Church in Bethlehem and the Church of Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem.

Last year, several Israeli military leaders warned of what they called “Jewish terrorism” due to the sharp increase of attacks carried out by extremist settlers against the army for dismantling random settlement outposts built on private Palestinian property in the occupied West Bank, and attacks against property and offices that belong to Israeli peace groups, mainly Israel’s Peace Now movement.