12 Palestinians have been arrested by Israeli security forces across the 1948 occupied territories on suspicion of involvement in the raging wildfires.
The abductions come as Israeli leaders have raised suspicions over the possibility that Palestinian assailants had intentionally set the blazes.
The suspects are being interrogated in connection to the fires flaring across the 1948 occupied Palestinian territories.
Israel Police Commissioner Roni Alsheich received instructions to form a committee to investigate the incident.
Speaking to reporters in the northern city of Haifa where firefighters were battling blazes engulfing several neighborhoods and tens of thousands of people were evacuated Alsheich claimed: “It’s likely that there is a nationalist motive in some of the arson cases.”
However he said there was no reason to suspect it was an “organized” effort adding that police would “investigate as needed.”
Alsheich added that some arrests had been made in connection with the fires but refused to give any additional details on the investigation.
The fires began three days ago at the Neve Shalom illegal settlement near Occupied Jerusalem where Israelis set up roots on Palestinian lands. Later blazes erupted in the northern Israeli area of Zichron Yaakov and elsewhere near Occupied Jerusalem before the largest ones spread across Haifa.
Israel’s Channel 7 quoted the so-called expert in Middle Eastern affairs David Bucaille as stating that he fled with his family from Hadar neighborhood due to the unabated fires which he attributed to the “coexistence of Arabs” next to the Israelis in Haifa.
He claimed that an arson attack was launched by Arabs as part of a campaign staged by Arab MKs in response to the Adhan ban bid.
Ayman Odeh head of the Joint (Arab) List Knesset faction hit back at the Israelis on Thursday for suggesting that fires raging across the country had been intentionally set by Arabs.
“To my regret someone decided to exploit this dreadful situation to incite and to lash out at an entire community” Odeh said.
“Whoever loves our homeland has to focus right now on putting out the fires and helping the injured and not on fanning hate” he added.
On Thursday Odeh called any arson cases “despicable” and said arsonists “are the enemy of us all.”
The rash of fires is the worst since 2010 when Israel was hit by the deadliest wildfire in its history. The 2016 blaze has burned out of control for four days and is being reined in only after firefighting aircraft arrived from as far away as Greece and Russia.
Though no serious injuries were caused several dozen Israelis were hospitalized for smoke inhalation.
Israel on Thursday called up military reservists to join overstretched police and firefighters and made use of an international fleet of firefighting aircraft sent by several countries.
