Vandals damage UNESCO site in southern Israel

Unknown vandals severely damaged an ancient Nabataean city in southern Israel, police said Tuesday.

The vandals knocked over arches and pillars and sprayed red paint on stone structures dating from the third century BC in the city of Avdat, declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2007.

Israel's Nature and National Parks Service estimated that restoring the damage would cost up to 8 million Israeli shekels, well over 2 million US dollars.

Israeli Internal Security Minister Yitzhak Aharonovitch visited the archeological site Tuesday, telling reporters that "my message to anyone who thinks they can vandalize a Jewish and World Heritage Site is very simple - we will not allow any such thing."

Police arrested two suspects, a park gatekeeper and a sheikh at a nearby Bedouin village. They said a suspected motive was revenge for the demolition of illegally-built Bedouin houses.

The Nabataeans were an ancient people of Arab nomads, successful in the caravan trade. Their most famous creation is the city of Petra carved out of rock in Jordan.

Avdat, in the Negev desert south of the Israeli city of Beersheba, sits in the centre of the famous ancient Spice Route that ran between Petra and Gaza.

Petra was the capital of the Nabataean kingdom annexed by the Romans in 106 AD.