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JENIN (Ma'an) -- Israeli forces detained two young Bedouin shepherds in the northern Jordan Valley after they were chased by Israeli settlers while pasturing their herds on Monday.

According to the mayor of the Al-Malih village, Israeli forces detained Jasir Qadri and Jilal Adel under the pretext that they were pasturing their herds near an Israeli settlement.

The mayor of the village and the nearby Bedouin dwellings, Arif Daraghmah, said that Jewish settlers from the neighboring Israeli settlement of Maskiyyot chased the two as they were pasturing their sheep in the Ein al-Hilweh area of Bedouin dwellings.

After they had been chased by the settlers, Israeli military vehicles arrived and detained the two Palestinian shepherds.

Israeli forces then chased and confronted other shepherds who were pasturing their herds in the region near Maskiyyot settlement, threatening to open fire at the sheep and detain the other shepherds if any of them came close to the settlement's borders.

An Israeli army spokeswoman did not know anything about the incident.

The majority of the Jordan Valley is under full Israeli military control, despite being within the Palestinian West Bank. More than 500,000 Israeli settlers live in settlements across the West Bank and East Jerusalem, in contravention of international law.

The internationally recognized Palestinian territories of which the West Bank and East Jerusalem form a part have been occupied by the Israeli military since 1967.
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