[AnNahar] A roadside kaboom hit a truck carrying full ballot boxes in northern Afghanistan Sunday, killing three people a day after the country voted for a successor to President Hamid Maybe I'll join the Taliban Karzai ... A former Baltimore restaurateur, now 12th and current President of Afghanistan, displacing the legitimate president Rabbani in December 2004. He was installed as the dominant political figure after the removal of the Taliban regime in late 2001 in a vain attempt to put a Pashtun face on the successor state to the Taliban. After the 2004 presidential election, he was declared president regardless of what the actual vote count was. He won a second, even more dubious, five-year-term after the 2009 presidential election. His grip on reality has been slipping steadily since around 2007, probably from heavy drug use... Eight boxes of votes were destroyed in the blast, which came as the three leading candidates voiced concerns about possible fraud.
Around seven million people turned out to vote, according to the Independent Election Commission (IEC), a turnout of over 50 percent despite poor weather and Taliban threats to target the election.
Sayed Sarwar Hossaini, police front man for the province of Kunduz, said the truck was hit as it carried ballot boxes from polling stations to Kunduz city.
"The blast killed three people, including an IEC member, a policeman and a driver. The truck and eight ballot boxes were destroyed," Hossaini said.
Amir Amza Ahmadzai, the head of the IEC in Kunduz, confirmed the incident.
Roadside bombs have been a key weapon for the Taliban in the bloody insurgency they have waged against Karzai's government and its Western backers since being ousted from power in 2001.
In the run-up to the poll the Islamists urged their fighters to target election workers, voters and security forces to disrupt the vote, which they rejected as a foreign plot.
Saturday's polling day passed off without major Death Eater attacks, though casualties were reported from small incidents around the country.
Emanuele Nannini, program coordinator for International NGO Emergency which runs three hospitals in Afghanistan, said they treated an unusually high number of maimed on Saturday.
"Around 30 war-related casualties were admitted into our hospitals in Kabul and Lashkar Gah," he told AFP.
Preliminary results are due on April 24 and if no candidate secures more than 50 percent of the vote, a runoff is planned for late May.
The front-runners are former World Bank economist Ashraf Ghani and former ministers Abdullah Abdullah ... the former foreign minister of the Northern Alliance government, advisor to Masood, and candidate for president against Karzai. Dr. Abdullah was born in Kabul and is half Tadjik and half Pashtun... and Zalmai Rassoul ... former foreign minister and a very close confidant of Hamid Karzai. Before serving as foreign minister Rassoul also spent seven years laboring as a national security adviser to the president. An ethnic Pashtun born in Kabul, Rassoul was the valedictorian of his class at the illustrious Franco-American school in Kabul, Lycee Istiqal. He has an MD from the Paris Medical School in France..... .
Whoever emerges victorious faces the prospect of fighting the Taliban without the help of 51,000 U.S.-led NATO ...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. A collection of multinational and multilingual and multicultural armed forces, all of differing capabilities, working toward a common goal by pulling in different directions... combat troops, which are withdrawing this year.
[AnNahar] Algerian police beefed up security and arrested about 20 people on Sunday at a campaign rally for President Abdelaziz Bouteflika's re-election, a day after violence ended a similar gathering.
Dozens of students hostile to the ailing 77-year-old's bid for a fourth term tried to demonstrate ahead of the rally in Tizi-Ouzou, in the mainly Berber region of Kabylie east of the capital.
"Free and democratic Algeria!" and "Boutef, pull out!" they chanted of the veteran leader, before police arrested about 20 people, journalists said.
Abdelmalek Sellal, the former prime minister who is Bouteflika's election campaign manager, then arrived to address the gathering of hundreds of supporters.
Bouteflika is widely expected to clinch another term in the April 17 election, but without taking to the campaign trail because of concerns about his health.
Tensions over his re-election bid turned violent on Saturday when protesters stormed a campaign rally in Bejaia, also in the Kabylie region, and torched portraits of him before attacking a television crew covering the event.
In 2001, 126 people died in Kabylie during violent clashes between the security forces and Berbers protesting about discrimination, poor living and working conditions and alleged government corruption.
Bouteflika's main challenger, Ali Benflis, condemned the violence which prompted Sellal to call off Saturday's rally.
"I regret that this campaign is taking place in a climate of tensions," Benflis said in a statement issued Sunday at a rally in his hometown of Batna, in another mainly Berber region, the Aures.
"I have to be honest and say nothing has been done to ensure it is taking place in a calm and serene" atmosphere, he was quoted as saying.
"I call for the respect of freedom of expression in all circumstances, a value which is the cornerstone of my policy of national renewal."
Bouteflika's campaign headquarters blamed the violence on the Barakat movement (Arabic for 'That's Enough') formed to oppose his candidacy.
Sellal and other Bouteflika aides have been doing the leg work for the president, who is too frail to campaign after a mini stroke last year confined him to hospital in Gay Paree for three months.
The defense ministry, meanwhile, said the army killed an armed Islamist and seized weapons and equipment in a raid Saturday on hideouts in Jijel area of Kabylie.
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[AnNahar] At least two more people were killed in renewed tribal festivities in southern Egypt on Sunday, after 48 hours of violence that left 23 dead, security officials said.
The fresh violence came despite a beefed-up police presence in Aswan province to end fighting between the Bani Hilal, an Arab tribe, and the Dabudiya, a Nubian family.
Tribal vendettas are common in Egypt's poor, rural south, but police called the latest outbreak of violence the worst in recent memory.
Apart from the two dead, at least five other people were maimed in Sunday's festivities, the security officials said.
Long-standing rivalry flared Thursday after a woman was sexually accosted and both sides scrawled insulting graffiti, the interior ministry said.
Twenty-three people were killed in festivities over the next two days, including three people in a botched reconciliation meeting that ended in a gunbattle.
Interim prime minister Ibrahim Mahlab and his interior minister Mohammed Ibrahim both visited Aswan on Saturday to try to end the violence.
The army also said it intervened, accusing the Moslem Brüderbund of deposed Islamist president Mohammed Morsi ...the former president of Egypt. A proponent of the One Man, One Vote, One Time principle, Morsi won election after the deposal of Hosni Mubarak and jumped to the conclusion it was his turn to be dictator... of involvement in the unrest.
Since the army ousted Morsi last July, the military-installed authorities have blamed the Brotherhood for violence which has rocked Egypt daily for the past nine months.
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[AnNahar] Al-Qaeda chief Ayman al-Zawahiri ... Formerly second in command of al-Qaeda, now the head cheese, occasionally described as the real brains of the outfit. Formerly the Mister Big of Egyptian Islamic Jihad. Bumped off Abdullah Azzam with a car boom in the course of one of their little disputes. Is thought to have composed bin Laden's fatwa entitled World Islamic Front Against Jews and Crusaders. Currently residing in the North Wazoo area. That is not a horn growing from the middle of his forehead, but a prayer bump, attesting to how devout he is... 's brother is to stand trial with 67 others for forming a "terrorist group" and plotting attacks after Islamist president Mohammed Morsi ...the former president of Egypt. A proponent of the One Man, One Vote, One Time principle, Morsi won election after the deposal of Hosni Mubarak and jumped to the conclusion it was his turn to be dictator... 's ouster, Egyptian state media reported Sunday.
Mohammed al-Zawahiri was incarcerated You have the right to remain silent... last August, a month after Morsi's ouster by the army, and has been called to go on trial by the state prosecutor.
The military-installed authorities have since launched a crackdown against Morsi's supporters that has left more than 1,400 people dead and thousands locked away Book 'im, Mahmoud! Zawahiri and the other suspects are accused of having set up an "al-Qaeda-linked terrorist group" that plotted attacks against government installations, security personnel and members of Egypt's Christian minority, state news agency MENA said.
The group was seeking to "spread chaos and undermine security" across Egypt, it said.
MENA did not say whether the group had actually carried out any attacks, nor did it give a date for the trial.
It said 50 of the accused were in jug, while others are on the run.
Judicial sources said investigations revealed the group had pressed members to go and fight the regime in Syria, but they were ordered to return to Egypt after June 30, 2013.
They were called back to confront Egypt's new authorities following Morsi's ouster, the sources added.
Morsi was ousted by former army chief Abdel Fattah al-Sisi after millions erupted into the streets on June 30 demanding his resignation.
Sisi is now running for president and is expected to win an election on May 26-27.
Judicial sources said Zawahiri was being charged with having formed the group, armed its members, and trained them in manufacturing explosives and planting bombs.
They said the authorities had evidence that the group's members were trained at secret locations in the Nile Delta city of Sharqiya and in Cairo's Matareya and October 6 districts.
Since Morsi's ouster, Sharqiya has been hit by frequent bad boy attacks on security forces, while violent festivities in Matareya and October 6 have pitted the Islamist's backers against police.
The authorities have regularly accused Morsi's outlawed Moslem Brüderbund of financing radical Islamists linked to al-Qaeda.
Zawahiri himself, who is an Egyptian national, was detained after being freed in the 2011 revolt that ousted Hosni Mubarak ...The former President-for-Life of Egypt, dumped by popular demand in early 2011... Egypt has been hit by a string of bombings and shootings targeting security forces since Morsi's overthrow.
The government says almost 500 people, mostly coppers and soldiers, have died in the attacks.
Most of the attacks have taken place in the lawless Sinai Peninsula, but the jihadists have increasingly targeted police in the capital and in the Nile Delta to the north.
The deadliest attacks have been claimed by Sinai-based al-Qaeda inspired group, Ansar Beit al-Maqdis, but the authorities have blamed the blacklisted Brotherhood.
[AnNahar] Boko Haram ... not to be confused with Procol Harum, Harum Scarum, possibly to be confused with Helter Skelter. The Nigerian version of al-Qaeda and the Taliban rolled together and flavored with a smigeon of distinctly Subsaharan ignorance and brutality... snuffies attacked a village in restive northern Nigeria, killing 17 people and setting houses and cars alight, the local government said Sunday.
Among the dead were Mohammedan worshipers shot as they prayed in the village mosque, said Abdullahi Bego, front man for the governor of the troubled state of Yobe.
"The gunnies are Boko Haram people, it was the same pattern of attacks they are known for," he told Agence La Belle France Presse.
"They also burnt several houses and many vehicles before fleeing," he said.
Yobe and neighboring Borno states are in the grip of an almost five-year-old Boko Haram insurgency that has claimed thousands of lives.
The violent Islamist group, whose name means "Western education is sinful" in the Hausa language, has attacked isolated villages, schools and churches as well as military bases in a brutal campaign.
Confronted with the violent insurrection, Nigerian troops launched a major crackdown in May 2013 against Boko Haram, which wants to create a separate hardline Islamic state in northern Nigeria.
The conflict has forced hundreds of thousands of people to flee in fear either to other Nigerian states or neighboring countries.
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[AnNahar] Gunmen believed to be Fulani herdsmen stormed a meeting in northern Nigeria's Zamfara state and killed 30 people, police said Sunday.
"Thirty people were killed and several others injured," Zamfara state police front man Lawal Abdullahi told Agence La Belle France Presse.
"The incident happened in Galadima yesterday during a meeting of community leaders and representatives of vigilante groups" who were discussing ways to thwart armed robbers and cattle rustlers, he said.
He said security forces had deployed to the area.
Survivors said more than 60 people might have died in the attack.
"We counted 61 bodies from the scene of the attack last night, while many people were maimed," a survivor who gave his name only as Babaginda from neighboring Kaduna state told AFP.
He said he was lucky to escape with his life and implored the security forces to stem incessant attacks by Fulani rustlers on villages in the area.
The conflict between Fulani herdsmen and local farmers over land rights, particularly in central Nigeria, has persisted for more than a decade despite a series of peace efforts across several states.
Last month, some 100 people were killed in Kaduna state when assailants armed with guns and machetes attacked local farming villages.
Fulani leaders have for years complained about the loss of grazing land crucial to their livelihood, and resentment between the herdsmen and their agrarian neighbors has risen over the past decade.
Under Nigerian law, indigenous people have enhanced rights in their home areas, including preferential access to public education and jobs.
The Fulani claim they have been systematically disenfranchised. The disputes vary from state to state and often have a religious element, especially in areas where farmers are predominantly Christian.
[AnNahar] A Bahraini court on Sunday sentenced seven Shiites to 15 years in jail after convicting them of an attack which maimed a policeman during a protest, a judicial source said.
The defendants admitted taking part in an authorized protest and being in possession of Molotov cocktails, the source said.
During the December 2012 demonstration in the Shiite village of Dia near Manama, coppers were attacked and one was maimed.
Dozens of Shiites have been tried over unrest following Arab Spring-inspired protests in mid-February 2011, during which demonstrators called for reforms in the Sunni-ruled kingdom.
The Shiite-led protests led to a nationwide crackdown a month later, backed by Saudi-led Gulf forces which rolled into Bahrain in support of the ruling al-Khalifa family.
Three years on and Bahrain, home to the U.S. Fifth Fleet, remains deeply divided and demonstrators frequently clash with security forces in Shiite villages outside the capital.
Last year, authorities increased the penalties for those convicted of violence, introducing the death penalty or life sentences in certain cases.
At least 89 people have been killed in Bahrain since the protests began, according to the International Federation for Human Rights.
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A total of seven individuals were shot to death or were found dead since last Tuesday in southern Chihuahua state municipalities, according to Mexican news accounts.
According to a news report which appeared in the online edition of El Sol de Parral news daily, three men were found shot to death Friday evening.
The victims, two of whom were identified as Edil Bitelio Jimenez Payan, 30, and JosĂŠ Isaias Torres Meza, 33, were both both from Guadalue y Calvio municipality. Local residents had filed a complaint about three dead bodies on the Guadlupe y Calvo to Parral road, dead from gunshot wounds near the village of Turuachi. All three victims were shot in the head.
Meanwhile in Bachiniva municipality, a man was found shot to death April 1st near a location called San JosĂŠ y Anexas. The news report said he was struck with rounds from a 9mm weapon, probably a pistol.
Lastly, in Cuauhtemoc municipality last Thursday one unidentified individual was wounded and another unofficially was killed in an encounter with a Mexican Army unit, according to a separate news report in El Diario de Chihuahua news daily.
According to a news account gunfire was exchanged between the occupants of a Chevrolet Silverado pickup truck and a Mexican Army road patrol.
Chris Covert writes Mexican Drug War and national political news for Rantburg.com and BorderlandBeat.com. He can be reached at grurkka@gmail.com
A total of ten unidentified individuals were shot to death or were found shot to death over the weekend in the northern border state of Tamaulipas, according to official Mexican news accounts.
Saturday night in Miguel Aleman municipality, a Mexican Army road patrol encountered armed suspects traveling in a convoy, and exchanged gunfire with the suspects leaving four dead and two wounded.
According to a news release which appeared on the official website of Tamaulipas state, the army patrol encountered a convoy including a Chevrolet Silverado pickup truck in the village of Los Guerra and attempted to affect a traffic stop, only to be fired on. Mexican Army counterfire ended the confrontation.
Soldiers seized 17 rifles, one 0.50 caliber Barret rifle, 11 grenades, two grenade launcher attachments, three handguns, weapons magazines, ammunition, tactical gear and a package of marijuana. Five unidentified individuals were also detained at the scene.
According to official reports, Mexican Army units have been reinforcing the region following a Friday night incident in which a hotel in Migeul Aleman was fired on by armed suspects said to be part of the convoy the unit encountered a day later. No one was reported hurt in the incident. Damage was limited to the facade of the building.
Meanwhile in southern Tamaulipas, six unidentified individuals were shot to death in a series of shootings in Tampico and Madero municipalities Saturday and Sunday.
According to the official version, three unidentified individuals were shot to death at a hotel in Madero Sunday afternoon at about 1510 hrs. The shooting was said to be an assassination. Of the three victims, one of them was said to be an employee of the hotel.
In Tampico at around 1530 hrs, one unidentified man was found shot to death at the intersection of calles San Pedro and Nardos in Las Violetas colony.
An hour later in Madero one unidentified man was shot to death by armed suspects traveling aboard a Volkswagen Jetta. The incident took place near the intersection of calles Malva and Lilas in El Chipus colony.
At around 1650 an unidentified man was found shot to death near the intersection of calles Honduras and Aduana in Talleres colony.
Officials say that three separate intergang firefights took place in Tampico Saturday night, but police were unable to find any bodies.
Chris Covert writes Mexican Drug War and national political news for Rantburg.com and BorderlandBeat.com. He can be reached at grurkka@gmail.com
[Dawn] KARACHI: The Crime Investigation Department (CID) of police on Saturday claimed to have killed two suspected forces of Evil in an encounter in the militancy-infested area of Sohrab Goth.
The police also claimed to have seized 100 kilos of kaboom, one Kalashnikov assault rifle, two TT pistols and five hand grenades.
Acting on secret information provided by a federal intelligence agency, the CID police carried out a targeted raid near Deluxe Homes in Sohrab Goth, said official in charge of CID (anti-extremism cell) DSP Ali Raza.
The raid was carried out in the early hours of Saturday, he said.
On seeing the coppers, the suspects opened fire which was retaliated by the CID police, with the result that two suspects, identified as Abdullah and Zakaria, sustained bullet injuries. They were taken to the Civil Hospital Bloody Karachi ...formerly the capital of Pakistain, now merely its most important port and financial center. It is among the largest cities in the world, with a population of 18 million, most of whom hate each other and many of whom are armed and dangerous... where doctors pronounced them dead.
"The dear departed belonged to the banned Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistain (Khan Zaman group)," said the CID officer.
DSP Raza said the group was mainly involved in kidnapping for ransom incidents. He said two of their accomplices, Khan Zaman and Abid alias Muchhar, managed to escape from the spot, taking advantage of darkness.
'Robbers' kill KWSB officer
A senior officer of the Karachi Water and Sewerage Board was killed by suspected robbers for resisting an armed robbery in Gulistan-e-Jauhar, police said, claiming that they managed to arrest one of the suspects in a maimed condition.
The police said four suspects entered the bungalow of 35-year old, Zahoor Zamir, in Block-12 of Gulistan-e-Jauhar at around 4am by climbing the wall of a nearby under-construction building, said Sharea Faisal SHO Aslam Pervez.
They snatched four cellphones and a purse containing around Rs12,000 in cash from the people. In the meantime, Mr Zamir managed to take out his licensed pistol and fired at the robbers, leaving one of them maimed. In retaliation, his accomplices shot at and maimed the house owner before fleeing. The area police had arrived by then and enjugged Yez got nuttin' on me, coppers! Nuttin'! the
maimed suspect, identified as Mohammed Rasool, and shifted him along with the house owner to the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre. While doctors pronounced Mr Zamir dead on arrival, the suspected robber was admitted to the intensive care unit.
The police said the victim was a deputy director in the KWSB.
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[AnNahar] Attacks killed 10 people in Iraq on Sunday while six gunnies also died as the country grapples with its worst bloodshed in years just weeks before parliamentary elections.
Among those killed were six who died in a mass liquidation south of Storied Baghdad, in scenes reminiscent of the worst of Iraq's 2006-07 sectarian conflict in which tens of thousands were killed.
The surge in violence has left more than 2,400 people dead so far this year.
It is principally driven by anger in the Sunni Arab minority over alleged mistreatment at the hands of the Shiite-led authorities, as well as spillover from the war in neighboring Syria.
The deadliest of the bloodshed on Sunday struck in Latifiyah, south of Storied Baghdad within the confessionally mixed Triangle of Death, so called because of the brutal violence which plagued the area during the peak of Iraq's confessional war.
Six Sunni Arabs were killed by myrmidons, security and medical officials said, but accounts differed as to how they died.
Two officials reported a family of six were stabbed to death, while others said six Sunni men were taken from various houses in the town and rubbed out.
Attacks also struck in the restive northern provinces of Kirkuk, ... a thick stew of Arabs, Turkmen, Kurds, and probably Antarcticans, all of them mutually hostile most of the time... Nineveh and Salaheddin, leaving four people dead, while six gunnies were also killed.
Diplomats and analysts have urged the authorities to reach out to the Sunni community to undermine support for militancy.
But with parliamentary elections looming at the end of this month, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki ... Prime Minister of Iraq and the secretary-general of the Islamic Dawa Party.... and other Shiite leaders have been loath to be seen to compromise.
Near-daily bloodshed is part of a long list of voter concerns that also include lengthy power cuts, poor waste water treatment, rampant corruption and high unemployment.
[AnNahar] A man was killed and 10 Syrian refugees were placed in durance vile Drop the gat, Rocky, or you're a dead 'un! when a riot erupted in a desert camp of northern Jordan, a security chief said on Sunday.
"Unknown assailants shot and killed a 25-year-old Syrian man during the riots on Saturday" at Zaatari refugee camp, Brigadier General Waddah Hmud said.
"Police did not use weapons against the refugee," Hmud, who heads a department in charge of Syrian refugee affairs, told news hounds at the sprawling camp.
Another security official named the dead man as Khalid Nemri.
Witnesses at Zaatari, which houses more than 100,000 refugees, told Agence La Belle France Presse on Saturday that a woman was killed in a clash with Jordanian police.
"Police arrested 10 Syrian rioters for their role in the riots," Hmud said, adding that 29 coppers were also injured.
Jordanian officials said the riot broke out after the detention of a group of refugees who had left the camp "illegally." Three refugees were maimed.
"Around 5,000 Syrians took part in the riots. Anti-riot police had to fire tear gas to disperse them," Hmud said.
U.N. refugee agency the UNHCR said in a statement that "three Syrian refugees were sent to hospital with gunshot wounds and one has since died."
The agency said the trouble began after a Jordanian vehicle was stopped for a routine check while leaving the camp.
Police at the checkpoint "discovered that the driver was attempting to smuggle a Syrian refugee family out of the camp," a UNHCR statement said.
It said the driver and family were detained, but once this became known, relatives and friends of the Syrian family headed for the police post.
"Soon several hundred, possibly thousands refugees were on scene and throwing rocks at the Gendarmes and the situation quickly evolved from a heated demonstration to a violent one."
The UNHCR called on Syrian refugees "to respect Jordanian law."
Since opening two years ago, Zaatari near the border with Syria has been the scene of several protests, mainly over poor living conditions.
Jordan is currently home to more than 500,000 Syrian refugees.
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[Ynet] Said Nafa, former representative of Balad party, met in Syria with Popular Front leader; Nafa was convicted of both illegally exiting to enemy state and aiding others to do so.
The Nazareth District Court convicted former Balad Knesset Member Said Nafa of contact with a foreign agent, illegal exit to an enemy country and aiding other to exist to an enemy country.
Nafa was acquitted of another charge of contacting a foreign agent after no evidence was found that he had met with the leader of the Hamas, always the voice of sweet reason, political bureau Khaled Mashal.
The offenses were committed in 2007 while Nafa, citizen of Beit Jann, served in the Knesset. Religious Druze leaders turned to him for help to organize a trip to Syria, and Nafa helped them though the Interior Ministry did not approve the trip. Nafa was aided by former Knesset Member Azmi Bishara, who left the country of fear he would be accused of security offenses and Nafa replaced him in the Knesset.
In September 2007, 282 religious leaders, joined by Nafa, crossed the border into Syria. Nafa stayed in the enemy country for seven days, in which he met with secretary general of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Paleostine ... Paleostinian Marxist movement, founded in 1967. It is considered a terrorist organization by more than 30 countries including the U.S., European Union, Australia, Canada, and Antarctica. The PFLP's stated goal is the establishment of a socialist State in Paleostine. They pioneered armed aircraft hijackings in the late 60s and early 70s... -- General Command (PFLP-GC), Talal Naji.
Nafa denied at first that he had met with Naji and claimed that his assistant, who joined him on the trip, was the one who met with him. Eventually, Nafa confirmed at court that he had met with Naji, but claimed it was a coincidental meeting, without prior scheduling, and was not secretive.
Judge Ester Helman, who wrote the verdict, stated however that "it was a meeting that was planned ahead of time, and its very existence was kept secret. The defendant was surprised and could not believe the Sherlocks learned about the meeting. He made every effort to deny it and to find out how the information was leaked, knowing that such an encounter crossed red lines, as he himself defined."
The defendant denied the third charge -- a meeting with the leader of the Hamas political bureau Khaled Mashal, however confirmed that Nazi tried to coordinate such a meeting through the phone in his office, while Nafa was present. However, there's more than one way to skin a cat... the only evidence proving the meeting indeed took place is a box of candy Nafa told his assistant he had received from Mashaal -- and the assistant's testimony. According to the judge, it can be proven that the meeting was arranged, but there is not enough evidence to convict Nafa in executing the meeting.
In regards to the trip to Syria and aiding the delegation of religious leaders, Nafa was convicted of offenses of illegally exiting to an enemy state and aiding the offense. The judge ruled that not only did Nafa help the delegation members obtain the required approvals and coordinate the visit, but he also took responsibility for the delegation's behavior in Syria. His sentence will be determined at a later time.
[Ynet] Youth who threw Molotov cocktail ignored calls to stop and was shot in the legs; Border Police jeep catches on fire, but soldiers unharmed.
A Molotov cocktail was thrown at a Border Police jeep on route 60 near the village of Huwara in the West Bank on Sunday.
The Border coppers got off the jeep as it caught fire, and started chasing the Paleostinians who threw the Molotov cocktail.
During the chase, one of the Border coppers identified a suspect with another Molotov cocktail, and told him to let go of the Molotov cocktail, while shooting warning shots.
The suspect went on to light up the Molotov cocktail and the Border coppers shot at the Paleostinian's lower body to neutralize him. The suspect, aged 20, was hit in his leg and taken to a nearby Paleostinian hospital in an army ambulance.
None of the Border copperswere maimed in the incident, Police front man Mickey Rosenfeld told AFP.
A source in the Paleostinian security services confirmed the incident and circumstances to AFP.
"A Paleostinian was maimed by an Israeli policeman after throwing Molotov cocktails at an Israeli patrol. Soldiers came out of the jeep and shot him," she said.
[Ynet] A mortar shell went kaboom! on Sunday afternoon near a kibbutz in the Sha'ar HaNegev Regional Council. No injuries or damages were reported.
Residents in the area reported hearing a blast, but no Code Red siren was heard prior to the mortar's fall. The IDF was checking to see whether it was a malfunction in the alert system, as the fall was identified by it.
[AnNahar] The Lebanese army tossed in the slammer Drop the gat, Rocky, or you're a dead 'un! on Sunday a number of armed Syrians in the Bekaa region of Arsal, reported Voice of Leb radio (93.3).
It said that a shootout broke out between the army and the five Syrians when they shot up an army patrol in the Wadi Hmayyed area.
It identified the assailants as Mouwaffaq al-Hajj Qassem, Seifeddine Turfa, Fares Abbas, Wael Moussa Ouweidan, and Turab Mohammed Matar.
Investigations are underway with the assailants.
On Thursday, a Syrian was killed and two others were maimed by the army in Arsal.
The army was forced to open fire at the Syrians after they fled from an army checkpoint in Wadi Hmayyed.
Arsal lies 12 kilometers from the border with Syria and has been used as a conduit for weapons and rebels to enter Syria, while also serving as a refuge for people fleeing the conflict.
[AnNahar] At least 13 rebels died in a blast in the city of Homs in central Syria on Sunday as they primed a car bomb for an attack, an NGO said.
Darwin wins again.
In the capital, meanwhile, two people were killed when mortar fire struck the Damascus Opera House.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said at least 13 rebels were killed in the besieged Old City of Homs when a car bomb exploded.
"The death toll is likely to rise because there are dozens of people missing and body parts in the area of the blast," the Britain-based group said.
State news agency SANA also reported the blast, saying a car had exploded while being loaded with explosives.
The blast took place on the outskirts of the besieged Old City of Homs, which is under rebel control.
Some 1,400 civilians were able to leave the area this year under U.N. supervision, but an estimated 1,500 people remain until the army siege.
In the capital, SANA said two people were killed in mortar fire by rebel fighters.
"Two people were killed and five wounded by a mortar round that hit the Damascus Opera House" near key government and military buildings on Umayyad Square, it said.
The attack damaged the Opera House, which was inaugurated by President Bashar Assad in 2004.
Mortar fire also wounded three people in the Abbasids neighborhood of northeast Damascus, SANA said.
On Saturday, mortar rounds struck near the Russian embassy, said the Syrian Observatory.
The rebel fire on Damascus comes as government forces step up a campaign to crush insurgents in its eastern suburbs, the Observatory said.
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
Zawahiri
[AnNahar] Gunmen believed to be Fulani herdsmen stormed a meeting in northern Nigeria's Zamfara state and killed 30 people, police said Sunday.
[Dawn] KARACHI: The Crime Investigation Department (CID) of police on Saturday claimed to have killed two suspected 
Nouri al-Maliki
Popular Front for the Liberation of Paleostine
