"Itamar Massacre"Thai workers rounded up in Itamar

NABLUS -Israeli forces on Monday afternoon rounded up all Thai workers employed in the Itamar settlement, site of the murder of five members of the Fogel family, and held them for questioning, informed sources told Ma'an.

Though Palestinians have been forbidden from working in the settlements of the northern West Bank, foreign workers, mostly from Thailand and the Philippines, have been contracted for labor in the area.

Sources close to some of the Thai laborers said that all of the workers had been gathered and taken for questioning in relation to the stabbing deaths of a settler family on Friday night.

Israeli officials have refused comment, and statements to the media maintain that forces are searching for Palestinian militants in connection with the murders.

Meanwhile, Israeli forces detained over 300 Palestinians in Awarta in the Nablus district after imposing a three-day curfew on residents, Palestinian security officials told AFP. Two Palestinian Authority intelligence officers were amongst those detained, officials added.

The militant wings of Hamas, Islamic Jihad and Fatah have all denied involvement in the murders, with the Al-Aqsa Brigades saying Monday in a statement that they "oppose the targeting of civilians and killing of children no matter what the pretext may be."

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has accused the Palestinian Authority of incitement, saying that comments against illegal Israeli settlements provoked the violent attack.

The Gaza government accused Israel of being hasty in its assumption that the killings were perpetrated by Palestinians, calling Israeli media and government spokespeople premature when they labeled the incident a "terrorist attack."