RIYADH, April 5: Jordan, Behrain and several other Arab states saw big and at times violent anti-Israel demonstrations on Friday.

Saudi security forces banned a demonstration near the US consulate in the eastern city of Dhahran, following warnings by the authorities, the head of the organizing committee and witnesses said.

“(Riot) police are blocking all roads (at the scene) and a large number of people are being rounded up,” Sheikh Abdul Hamid al-Sheikh, head of the Popular Committee of Support for Palestine, said on the Al-Jazeera television.

The committee had called for the demonstration in the oil-rich Eastern Province after Friday prayers to protest Israel’s onslaught on West Bank towns.

Saudi Interior Minister Prince Nayef bin Abdul Aziz had warned on Thursday that demonstrations would not be tolerated after protesters burned Israeli and US flags during a pro-Palestinian march on Monday in the town of Skaka, in the north of the kingdom.

Eyewitnesses told said “around 1,000 demonstrators” were prevented by security forces from reaching the US consulate in Dhahran amid a heavy police deployment in the area.

Police banned traffic on the Dammam-Dhahran road and roads leading to the consulate, but there were no arrests, the witnesses said, adding that some 30,000 Americans live in the area, most of whom work for the Aramco oil company.

Witnesses also said hundreds of Palestinians and Saudi supporters gathered inside the Palestinian embassy in Riyadh on Thursday evening, chanting anti-Israeli slogans and burning an Israeli flag.

In Amman, Police clashed with several thousand people when they tried to march on the Israeli embassy in one of several large demonstrations in the Jordanian capital and elsewhere on Friday.

Riot police fired teargas on protesters estimated at more than 3,000 and chased them with clubs to stop them approaching the embassy in the Rabiyeh residential neighbourhood of west Amman, witnesses said.

Heavy police reinforcements were deployed around the embassy from early morning, where they closed off several roads.—Reuters