Ma'ale Akrabim massacre

Ma'ale Akrabim massacre
The bus after the incident
Location of the attack (Near the Ein Netafim spring, on Highway 12, Southern Israel)
Location	Scorpions Pass, south of Makhtesh Katan
Coordinates	30°54′24″N 35°07′53″E / 30.90667°N 35.13139°E / 30.90667; 35.13139
Date	16/17 March 1954 (IST, UTC +2)
Attack type	Ambush
Deaths	11
Non-fatal injuries	2
Suspected perpetrators	Arab gunmen from Jordan or Egypt

The Ma'ale Akrabim massacre, known in English as the Scorpion Pass Massacre, was an attack on an Israeli passenger bus, carried out on 17 March 1954, in the middle of the day. Eleven passengers were shot dead by the attackers who ambushed and boarded the bus. Four passengers survived, two of whom had been injured by the gunmen.

Scorpions Pass (Hebrew: מעלה עקרבים‎‎, Ma'ale Akrabim) is a narrow, winding grade on the old road connecting Eilat and Beersheba, just south of Makhtesh Katan, and roughly 60 miles south of Beersheba. The pass was on the primary route between Eilat and central Israel in 1954.

The 1948 Arab–Israeli war ended with the signing of several armistice agreements between Israel and her neighboring Arab states, but border clashes began almost immediately after the signing agreements. On the Israeli-Jordanian border lines, infiltrations, unarmed (71%) and armed (29%), were not infrequent from both sides. According to Israeli sources, between June 1949 and the end of 1952, a total of 57 Israelis, mostly civilians, were killed by infiltrators from Jordan. The Israeli death toll for the first 9 months of 1953 was 32. Over roughly the same time (November 1950 – November 1953), the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan/Israel Mixed Armistice Commission (HJK/IMAC) condemned Israeli military reprisal actions 44 times and claimed that it suffered 629 killed and injured from Israeli incursions. Similar attacks, carried out largely by Palestinian commandos likely with some Egyptian support, originated from across the Egyptian border and the Gaza strip. Israel historian Benny Morris states that between 1949 and 1956 between 200 and 250 Israelis were killed by infiltrators and a similar number of Israeli soldiers were killed in action. Other sources give a total of 1,300 killed over this period. Many Palestinians died during the infiltration with Benny Morris writing that “Israel’s defensive anti-infiltration measures resulted in the death of several thousand mostly unarmed Arabs during 1949-56.” A group named as the "Black Hand", composed of predominantly Bedouin from 'Azazme and Tarrabin tribes living within the al-Auja Demilitarised zone, were known to be carrying out 'revenge raids' principally against other Bedouin, informers in the area but also against Israeli targets.