ACRE, (Israel), Oct 13: Israeli President Shimon Peres called on Monday for reconciliation between the Arabs and Jews of Acre, where five days of rioting exposed deep-seated tensions and raised fears of a nationwide chain reaction.

“Try to live together despite your differences. There are two religions but there is one law for all,” Peres told Arab and Jewish religious and political leaders in the northern coastal city.

Trouble began in Acre last Wednesday when youths attacked an Arab who drove into a mainly Jewish neighbourhood, disturbing the start of Yom Kippur, the holiest day in the Jewish calendar during which many Jews fast and abstain from driving.

When mosque loudspeakers spread word of Jewish youths beating an Arab, Arab crowds rioted, damaging cars and shops.

Jews set fire to two Arab homes and damaged nine others.

“Fortunately, nobody was hurt, nobody was killed,” said Peres, congratulating some 700 police who battled to restore calm while the rest of Israel held its breath.

Sixty years after Israel was established in what was then Palestine, one in five citizens is Arab. Many say they feel treated as second-class.

In Acre, Arabs make up 28 per cent of the population, many living in separate districts but doing business daily with their Jewish neighbours. Some Arab families in Acre now demand to be relocated.

Despite the police presence, the marketplace in the ancient walled city, where Jews and Arabs usually mingle, was empty.

“I usually sell 30 baskets of fish a day. Since the riots started, I’ve hardly sold one,” said trader Ahmed Zakkour.

PEACE TENT: The Arab driver who drove into the Jewish neighbourhood on Yom Kippur, Tawfik Jamal, appeared on Sunday before parliament’s Interior Committee, saying he “just wanted to get home”.

“It was a mistake and I want to apologise,” he said.

But Aviva Gilad, a Jewish councilman, insisted that Acre “is a Jewish town and we want Arabs to respect our holiest day”.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, who warned recently of mounting violence by Jewish hardliners, blamed extremists on both sides for the riots.

Israeli and Palestinian leaders have agreed in principle on a peace settlement for the Middle East which would create a state next door to Israel for the four million Arabs of the West Bank and Gaza. But hopes of any deal soon are dwindling.—Reuters