THEY call it the Cemetery of the Fallen Enemy, a bleak and desolate name for a bleak and desolate place.

In this secret site at the end of a dirt road in the Jordan Valley, its perimeter patrolled by Israeli soldiers with belt-fed machineguns, Israel buries the remains of Palestinian suicide bombers, gunmen and other enemies of the Jewish state.

Military sources say that between 60 and 80 Palestinians have been buried here since 1979, their graves marked by numbered plaques. In one corner three cheap wooden coffins wait their turn.

The Israelis’ refusal to return the remains of their “martyrs” angers the Palestinians, particularly on the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Fitr, when families traditionally visit graves of their relatives. Needless to say, there were no such visits here yesterday, only The Times and a million flies.

The Palestinians’ anger is, if anything, surpassed by Israeli fury at the extraordinary bungling that led to the most recent arrivals. The remains of six Palestinian suicide bombers were brought here only after they had first been buried in an Israeli cemetery where for months they lay just yards from Jews who had died in the 1948, 1967 and 1973 wars.

The Times has established that one of the bombers first buried at Revadim kibbutz cemetery, 25 miles south of Tel Aviv, was Hiba Daraghmeh, 19, of Islamic Jihad. A student of English from the West Bank, she killed three Israelis and wounded 48 when she blew herself up in Afula six months ago.

Like several Israeli cemeteries, the Revadim cemetery has a perimeter site reserved for “Jews in doubt”, usually foreign workers, those with non-Jewish mothers, or Orthodox Christian immigrants from the former Soviet Union who qualified for Israeli citizenship because of one Jewish grandparent.

Kibbutz residents were appalled to learn that 12 of the plots in the perimeter site, each marked almoni (unknown) contained Palestinian bombers. They contacted the Israeli authorities to demand their immediate removal, threatening to dig up the remains if nothing was done.

Uri Pinkerfeld, 75, the kibbutz zookeeper, said: “Our reaction was rage, simply rage. We felt deceived, and there was also a great security risk.

“But more than anything was the emotional reaction. We have our sons and dear ones buried here, our relatives who fell in the wars.”

Tsvi Steklov, one of the principal campaigners for the Palestinians’ removal, said: “If they hadn’t been taken away, I would have pulled the bodies out myself.”

An investigation by the Israeli military, police and the Forensic Institute at Abu Kbir confirmed that six were “terrorists”.

The police, rabbinical authorities and body removal experts arrived three weeks ago to exhume the bodies, witnesses said. Sources at Zaka, the Israeli group that identifies disaster victims, said that the bodies were transferred by ambulance to the Jordan Valley site.

Amid the shattered coffin lids, latex gloves and mounds of dirt marking the place at the kibbutz cemetery where the Palestinians were exhumed, The Times found the wooden sign bearing Daraghmeh’s name in Hebrew.

Israeli officials yesterday said that the bodies were clearly identified as mehabel almoni (unknown terrorist) when they were released from Abu Kbir institute to the burial contractor.

“It was a mistake. We buried them as unknowns,” a company spokesman insisted. He said that more bombers’ bodies might still lie in other cemeteries because until a few months ago they were treated like any other “unknown”’.

Israeli officials insisted that procedures had been tightened and that all bodies were now sent directly to one of the various fallen enemies’ cemeteries around Israel.

Mamoun Attil, a Palestinian human rights activist, complained that dozens of Palestinians’ bodies were being held by Israel. “This is a violation by the occupation forces of the internal laws and conventions,” he said.

An Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman said that some remains had been returned. “There is no clear-cut policy about returning bodies or not doing so,” he said.

“Some have been returned up to a year ago, but we don’t know of any more recently. Currently the issue is being looked into.”

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