Israel president admits wrongs to Arabs at massacre memorial

President Reuven Rivlin acknowledged Oct. 26 past and present wrongdoings to Israel's Arabs, while calling for calm in the wake of growing unrest in east Jerusalem and the West Bank.

Rivlin spoke at a memorial ceremony for victims of 1956 massacre at Kafr Qassem, where Israeli forces killed 47 residents of the central Israeli Arab village for breaking a wartime curfew, becoming the first Israeli president to attend the event.

"A terrible crime was committed here," he said. "The brutal killings in Kafr Qassem are an anomalous and sorrowful chapter in the history of the relations between Arabs and Jews living here."       

"I came here today, specifically during these difficult days to reach out my hand, in the belief, that your hands are outstretched to me and to the Israeli Jewish public in turn," the president said.

Violence pitting Palestinians against Israeli police has shaken annexed east Jerusalem on an almost daily basis since the murder of a Palestinian teenager by Jewish extremists in July.

Clashes intensified during the 50-day Gaza war over the summer.

Rivlin's visit came as preparations were underway for the funeral of an east Jerusalem man who on Oct. 22 drove his car at high speed into a crowd of Israelis, killing a baby. Kafr Qassem is situated in central Israel, adjacent to the West Bank.

In 1956, it was under military rule, and on October 29 - the first day of a war with Egypt - Israeli border policemen gunned down residents who were unaware a curfew had been imposed, killing men returning from work in the fields as well as women and children.

 Arab Israelis number around 1.4 million, some 20 percent of Israel's population.

They are the descendents of 160,000 Palestinian...