Israel Facebook: Mistranslated post creates security alert Published duration 22 October 2017

image copyright Getty Images image caption The post that caused the alert has now been deleted

Israeli police arrested a Palestinian man last week after a Facebook post he made saying "good morning" in Arabic was mistranslated to read "attack them" in Hebrew, local media have reported.

Police confirmed that the construction worker was briefly held under suspicion of incitement but was released as soon as the mistake was realised.

The post showed a photo of the worker next to a bulldozer in the West Bank.

There is only one difference in lettering between the colloquial Arabic phrase for "good morning to you all" and "hurt them", pointed out The Times of Israel

No Arabic-speaking officer was consulted before the arrest was carried out, say reports, with officers wholly dependent on Facebook's automatic translation.

The post in question has now been deleted.

Mordor is the name of a fictional region in JRR Tolkien's Lord of the Rings books.

In addition, "Russians" was translated to "occupiers".