History
The Border Police was founded as the Frontier Corps (Hebrew: חיל הספר, Heil HaSfar), a gendarmerie under the IDF in 1949 with the task of providing security in rural areas and along the borders. In the course of the following years, it was gradually transferred to the command of the Police and became the Border Police. During these years, it secured new settlements and countered infiltration of Palestinian Fedayeen, especially from Egypt and Jordan.
During the 1956 Suez War, the Border Police was involved in the Kafr Qasim massacre. On the second day of the war, a curfew was imposed on the Israeli Arab village. Villagers who had worked in the village fields and were apparently unaware of the curfew were shot as they returned to the village, resulting in 49 dead. This event raised a strong protest in the Israeli public and resulted in a landmark Supreme Court ruling on the obligation of soldiers to disobey manifestly illegal orders.
During the 1967 Six-Day War, the Border Police took part in the fighting alongside the IDF. Following the war, it was deployed in the West Bank and Gaza Strip and charged with maintaining law and order as part of the military administration. Since then, a significant portion of the Border Police's activity has been in these territories, especially during the years of the First Intifada and the Second (al-Aqsa) Intifada.
In 1974, the counter-terror unit Yamam was established.
In the October Riots the Border Police were used as the main branch of the treatment in the events. During al-Aqsa Intifada the Border Police took a large part in the security activity.
In 2005 the Border Police participated in the implementation of the disengagement plan.
The Border Police heaviest area of operation is the City of Jerusalem. Virtually all "soldiers" that can be seen patrolling the streets of Jerusalem are actually Border Guard Police officers. Approximately 20% of all Border Guard personnel in the country are located in the City of Jerusalem alone. Besides Jerusalem MAGAV also provides security, conducts military operations, raids and arrests on Palestinian people in cities like Jenin, Nablus, Jericho, Qalqilyah, Tul-Karem, Ramallah and Hebron.
The total number of Border Guards is believed to be about 6000 soldiers and officers.
Read more about this topic: Israel Border Police
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“Every generation rewrites the past. In easy times history is more or less of an ornamental art, but in times of danger we are driven to the written record by a pressing need to find answers to the riddles of today.... In times of change and danger when there is a quicksand of fear under men’s reasoning, a sense of continuity with generations gone before can stretch like a lifeline across the scary present and get us past that idiot delusion of the exceptional Now that blocks good thinking.”
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