Islamic fighters kill scores of Yazidi men in Iraq

Mazen Mahdi, EPA

A US Navy F/A-18 launches off from the flight deck of the aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush in the Persian Gulf waters on August 15, 2014.

5 hr ago By DIAA HADID and SAMEER N. YACOUB of Associated Press

IRBIL, Iraq (AP) — Islamic extremists shot scores of Yazidi men to death in Iraq, lining them up in small groups and opening fire with assault rifles before abducting their wives and children, according to an eyewitness, government officials and people who live in the area.

A Yazidi lawmaker on Saturday cited the mass killing in Kocho as evidence that his people are still at risk after a week of U.S. and Iraqi airstrikes on the militants.
Meanwhile, warplanes targeted insurgents around a large dam that was captured by the Islamic State extremist group earlier this month, nearby residents said.
In a statement, U.S. Central Command said the airstrikes Saturday were launched under the authority to support humanitarian efforts in Iraq, as well as to protect U.S. personnel and facilities.
Central Command says the nine airstrikes conducted so far had destroyed or damaged four armored personnel carriers, seven armed vehicles, two Humvees and an armored vehicle.
The U.S. began airstrikes against the Islamic State extremist group a week ago, in part to prevent the massacre of tens of thousands of Yazidis in northern Iraq. They fled the militants by scrambling up a barren mountain, where they got stranded. Most were eventually able to escape with help from Kurdish fighters.
Islamic State fighters had surrounded the nearby village 12 days ago and demanded that its Yazidi residents convert or die. On Friday afternoon, they moved in.
The militants told people to gather in a school, promising they would be allowed to leave Kocho after their details were recorded, said the eyewitness and the brother of the Kocho mayor, Nayef Jassem, who said he obtained his details from another witness.
The militants separated the men from the women and children under 12 years old. They took men and male teens away in groups of a few dozen each and shot them on the edge of the village, according to a wounded man who escaped by feigning death.
The fighters then walked among the bodies, using pistols to finish off anyone who appeared to still be alive, the 42-year-old man told The Associated Press by phone from an area where he was hiding. He spoke on condition of anonymity, fearing for his safety.
"They thought we were dead, and when they went away, we ran away. We hid in a valley until sundown, and then we fled to the mountains," he said.
A Yazidi lawmaker, a Kurdish security official and an Iraqi official from the nearby city of Sinjar gave similar accounts, saying Islamic State fighters had massacred many Yazidi men Friday after seizing Kocho.
All of them said they based their information on the accounts of survivors. Their accounts matched those of two other Yazidi men, Qassim Hussein and Nayef Jassem, who said they spoke to other survivors.
It was not clear precisely how many men were killed. Iraqi and Kurdish officials said at least 80 men were shot. Yazidi residents said they believed the number was higher, because there were at least 175 families in Kocho, and few were able to escape before the militants surrounded their hamlet.

AP Photo: Khalid Mohammed

Displaced Iraqis from the Yazidi community settle at a new camp outside the old camp of Bajid Kandala at Feeshkhabour town near the Syria-Iraq border, Iraq, Aug. 15, 2014.

Jassem said he was in touch with two wounded men, including a cousin, who fled the village. They called Jassem from the phone of a sympathetic shepherd and described what happened. On Saturday morning, Jassem's cousin called again, pleading for help.
"I can't walk, and we will die," Jassem said his cousin told him, his voice breaking. The 55-year-old said he called Yazidi rebels in the mountains, pleading with them to try to save the men. "They need first aid. Send them a donkey they can sit on, something to carry them." But Jassem said his cousin was a six-hour walk from the rebels and would die before help came. By evening, he lost contact with his relative.
The Yazidis are a centuries-old religious minority viewed as apostates by the Islamic State, which has claimed mass killings of its opponents in Syria and Iraq, often posting grisly photos online.
Yazidi lawmaker Mahma Khalil said the Yazidis in Kocho were given the choice to abandon their religion for that of the fighters. When they refused, "the massacre took place," he said.
Halgurd Hekmat, a spokesman for Kurdish security forces, said the militants took the women and children of Kocho to a nearby city.
Elsewhere in northern Iraq, residents living near the Mosul Dam told the AP that the area was being targeted by airstrikes.
The extremist group seized the dam on the Tigris River on Aug. 7. Residents living near the dam, which is Iraq's largest, say the airstrikes killed militants, but that could not immediately be confirmed. The residents spoke on condition of anonymity out of fears for their safety.
Tens of thousands of Yazidis fled earlier this month when the Islamic State group captured the town of Sinjar, near the Syrian border.
The plight of the Yazidis motivated U.S. and Iraqi forces to launch aid drops. It also contributed to the U.S. decision to launch airstrikes against the militants, who were advancing on the Kurdish regional capital Irbil.
But the Islamic State group remains in control of vast swaths of northeastern Syria and northern and western Iraq, and the scale of the humanitarian crisis prompted the U.N. to declare its highest level of emergency earlier this week.
Some 1.5 million people have been displaced by fighting since the Islamic State's rapid advance began in June.
The decision to launch airstrikes marked the first direct U.S. military intervention in Iraq since the last troops withdrew in 2011 and reflected growing international concern about the extremist group.
Khalil, the Yazidi lawmaker, said the U.S. must do more to protect those fleeing the Islamic State fighters.
"We have been calling on the U.S. administration and Iraqi government to intervene and help the innocent people," Khalil said. "But it seems that nobody is listening."
The United States was not alone in its efforts to ease the dangers in the region.
On Saturday, Britain's Ministry of Defense said it deployed a U.S.-made spy plane over northern Iraq to monitor the humanitarian crisis and movements of the militants. The converted Boeing KC-135 tanker, called a Rivet Joint, was to monitor mobile phone calls and other communication.
Germany's Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier was in Baghdad on Saturday, where he announced his government would provide more than 24 million euros ($32.2 million) in humanitarian aid to Iraq.
Also Saturday, two British planes landed in the Kurdish regional capital of Irbil carrying humanitarian supplies.
___
Yacoub reported from Baghdad. Associated Press writers Vivian Salama in Baghdad, Frank Jordans in Berlin and Shawn Pogatchnik in Dublin contributed to this report.

Official: Amish girls sexually abused in abduction

AP Photo: St. Lawrence County Sheriff

These images provided by the St. Lawrence County Sheriff's Office shows the booking photo of Stephan Howells II, 39, left, and Nicole Vaisey, 25, who were arraigned late Friday, Aug. 15, 2014, on charges they intended to physically harm or sexually abuse two Amish sisters after abducting them from a roadside farm stand.

12 min ago By Associated Press

CANTON, N.Y. (AP) — Two young Amish sisters were sexually abused after their abduction from a roadside farm stand in northern New York, a prosecutor said Saturday.

St. Lawrence County District Attorney Mary Rain's disclosure came hours after the county's sheriff said the couple charged in the kidnapping were prowling for easy targets and may have planned to abduct other children.
Stephen Howells Jr. and Nicole Vaisey, both of Hermon, were arrested and arraigned Friday on charges they abducted the 7-year-old and 12-year-old sisters with the intent to physically or sexually abuse them.
"We felt that there was the definite potential that there was going to be other victims," St. Lawrence County Sheriff Kevin Wells said.

2 charged in abduction of Amish girls

13 hr ago Duration: 1:03 Views: 48k

The sisters were abducted Wednesday from the farm stand in front of the family's home in Oswegatchie, near the Canadian border. They were set free by their captors about 24 hours later and turned up safe at the door of a house 15 miles from where they were taken.

The sheriff said Howells, 39, and Vaisey, 25, "were targeting opportunities" and did not necessarily grab the girls because they were Amish.

"There was a lot of thought process that went into this," Wells said. "They were looking for opportunities to victimize."

The suspects are being held without bail. A preliminary court appearance is scheduled for Thursday.
Vaisey's lawyer, Bradford Riendeau told The New York Times that Howells had abused Vaisey and treated her submissively. He said she made a "voluntary statement" to investigators after her arrest and was obtaining an order of protection against him.

"She appears to have been the slave and he was the master," Riendeau told the newspaper.
There was no answer Saturday at the St. Lawrence County Conflict Defender's Office, which is representing Howells.

Wells said the girls were able to provide details to investigators about their time in captivity.
The Associated Press generally does not identify people who may be victims of sexual abuse.
The kidnappings touched off a massive search in the family's remote farming community. Searchers scoured the community of about 4,000 people, but were hampered by a lack of photos of the girls.
The Amish typically avoid modern technology, and the family had to work with an artist who spoke their language, a German dialect known as Pennsylvania Dutch, to produce a sketch of the older girl.

Pro-Palestinian activists march to UN headquarters

AP: Craig Ruttle

Supporters of ending the violence in Gaza yell at a rally near Columbus Circle during a protest in New York, Saturday, Aug. 9, 2014.

4 hr ago By VERENA DOBNIK of Associated Press

NEW YORK (AP) — A sea of Palestinians and their sympathizers lined Manhattan streets Saturday, marching to the United Nations and shouting that Israel's response to missile attacks was genocide that took children's lives.

"What they're doing is wrong," said Ayia Mustafa, 12, of the New York borough of Bronx. "I'm here to protest what's going on in Gaza. What's going on is wrong — bad things like killing children."
She was among about 500 demonstrators who walked to the United Nations on Manhattan's East Side after gathering behind police barricades off Columbus Circle to protest Israeli actions in the Gaza Strip.
Hamas, which the United States and other countries consider a terrorist organization, governs much of Gaza.
In midtown Manhattan, police on motorcycles stood by, engines revved up to accompany the marchers before they peacefully headed toward the United Nations building.
"We are all Palestinians and because of the occupation there is no justice in Gaza," said Zouleikha Ban, 57, a native of Algeria who lives in the borough of Staten Island.

AP: Craig Ruttle

Supporters of ending the violence in Gaza pass through Times Square during a protest march in New York, Saturday, Aug. 9, 2014.

Several days previously, hundreds of Palestinian supporters marched and demonstrated in front of a midtown Manhattan office building after a 72-hour humanitarian cease fire broke down in Gaza. They said then they would hold more rallies as the conflict continues.
Behind metal police barricades at Columbus Circle on Saturday, demonstrators chanted: "Free, free Palestine! Occupation is a crime!" Organizers called for an end to U.S. aid to Israel.
Allaa Mustafa, Ayia's 14-year-old sister, said they're both American citizens. "But if we went to Gaza, we'd have more rights than Palestinians there," she said.
Some tapped into the history of the region.
Mostafa Asadi, an engineer from Philadelphia who came to New York for the protest, said the current violence in the Middle East started more than six decades ago.
"The Zionists took Palestinian land and expelled them in 1948, and now Israel is trying to control the area," said Asadi, 55, an Iran native who hoisted a sign that said: "Stop the U.S.-Israeli blockade of Gaza."
"The Israelis are racist," said Asadi.
Later Saturday, a social media movement aimed at uniting Jews and Arabs planned a silent protest and candlelight vigil in Dag Hammarskjold Plaza near U.N. headquarters.

Tibet bus accident kills 44 people, injures 11: Xinhua

 

AP Photo: Chogo

Rescuers work around an overturned tour bus after it fell off a 30-foot cliff in Nyemo County, southwest China's mountainous region of Tibet Saturday, Aug. 9.

8 hr ago By AFP

A tour bus plunged into a Tibetan valley on Saturday after hitting two vehicles, killing 44 people and injuring 11, China's official news agency Xinhua reported.

A tour bus plunged into a Tibetan valley on Saturday after hitting two vehicles, killing 44 people and injuring 11, China's official news agency Xinhua reported.
"The 55-seat bus carrying 50 people fell off a 10-metre-plus-high cliff after crashing into a sports utility vehicle and a pick-up truck," the report said, citing the regional government.
Another five people were in the other vehicles in the accident which happened at around 4:25 pm (0825 GMT) in Nyemo County, west of the capital Lhasa, in the Tibet Autonomous Region which is governed by China.
The bus passengers were mainly tourists from several eastern regions in China. The injured were being treated at hospitals in Lhasa and did not have life-threatening injuries, Xinhua said.
Pictures on the news agency's website showed rescue workers at the bus which was lying with its wheels in the air. A hoist was also pictured attached to the bus.
Police have detained the managers of a travel agency and vehicle tour company, blamed for the crash.
"The regional government has held an emergency meeting, ordering a general overhaul of road safety and travel safety across the region to avoid similar fatal accidents," the report added.
Fatal road accidents are a serious problem in China, particularly involving the country's often over-crowded long-distance buses.
The ministry of transport says the number of road deaths in China fell from 104,000 in 2003 to 60,000 in 2012, or from about 300 fatalities a day to less than 200.
A study published in 2011 by a group of Chinese and US researchers concluded, however, that the number of deadly accidents was twice higher than the police claimed.
In July, 43 people died when a van carrying inflammable liquid hit a bus on a motorway in central China.
In August 2012, at least 36 people died when a double-decker sleeper bus slammed into the rear of a methanol tanker and burst into flames in northern China

Is Putin Looking for a Way Out of Ukraine?

Provided by AtlanticNews

Photo

1 day ago By Brian Whitmore of AtlanticNews

The president's favorite journalist has floated an exit strategy.

Sometimes it's a good idea to pay attention to what Andrei Kolesnikov writes.
The Kommersant columnist is one of the Kremlin's anointed court scribes and is often described as President Vladimir Putin's favorite journalist. Ben Judah, author of Fragile Empire: How Russia Fell Out Of Love With Vladimir Putin, recently wrote that the Russian president &.uot;pays particular attention&.uot; to Kolesnikov's columns, which he enjoys &.uot;greatly and always reads right to the end.&.uot;
Kolesnikov regularly travels with Putin and is often a conduit for messages from the regime's inner sanctum to the broader elite. It was in an interview with Kolesnikov in the summer of 2010, on an epic road trip across the Russian Far East in a bright-yellow Lada, that Putin strongly hinted that he intended to return to the presidency in 2012 and that pro-democracy protesters should be beaten. Both of these things, of course, happened.
So it didn't go unnoticed when Kolesnikov wrote on July 29 that Putin was prepared to wash his hands of the separatists in eastern Ukraine if they were indeed proven to be responsible for the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17.
Kolesnikov's argument should by no means be taken at face value. Who really believes that Putin is suddenly shocked that the separatists he has been sponsoring could have shot down a civilian airliner? And does anybody really believe civilian deaths are a red line he will never cross? &.uot;If at some point it becomes evident that the insurgents had some connection to this, that would radically change [Putin's] attitude toward them—even if it was a fatal mistake,&.uot; Kolesnikov wrote. &.uot;Children who died for nothing, as well as adults and elderly people, this is a red line he will not cross. He will not cover up for those who did this if he knows they did it. He will not have this sin on his soul.&.uot;
But Kolesnikov doesn't write anything by accident. And it's safe to assume he doesn't write anything that is not Kremlin-approved. So with his July 29 column, he is clearly either floating a trial balloon or delivering a message from Putin to the elite that a change of policy is imminent.
There are other signals that a change in the Kremlin line may be coming. In an interview with CNN on July 22, Russia's UN Ambassador Vitaly Churkin said reports that the rebels in eastern Ukraine thought they had shot down a military aircraft around the same time that MH17 crashed suggested they weren't really culpable. &.uot;According to them, the people from the east were saying that they shot down a military jet, so if it was [that they thought they] shot down a military jet, there was confusion,&.uot; Churkin said. &.uot;If there was confusion, it was not an act of terrorism.&.uot;
Kolesnikov's column has also provoked a bit of hand-wringing in the nationalist press. &.uot;Common people who read King Lear think that court jesters exist to tell the monarch the truth with a smile on their face,&.uot; Yegor Kholmogorov wrote in Vzglyad.  &.uot;The truth is that they are used to tell lies in the monarch's name. Andrei Kolesnikov is one such person who is close to Putin who set off a storm among journalists who are accustomed to seeing signals every time he sneezes.&.uot;
It's too early to tell whether this was a trial balloon, a signal of a policy shift, or a court jester telling noble lies for the king. But the column's timing, on the day when the European Union and the United States announced tough new sanctions against Russia's financial and energy sectors, was certainly interesting.
It also comes at a time when Russia's erstwhile defenders in Europe appear to be distancing themselves from the Putin regime—putting additional pressure on the Kremlin. In a cover story last week titled &.uot;Stop Putin Now!&.uot; the Hamburg-based weekly Der Spiegel reported that &.uot;52 percent of Germans said they would favor tougher sanctions, even if they would lead to the loss of many jobs in Germany.&.uot; According to the article, Germany's business community, which has close ties to Russia, &.uot;has also gotten the message. Although the initial sanctions had few direct consequences for them, many business leaders had warned against sanctions—drawing the ire of the chancellor and other politicians. Now they are changing their position.&.uot;
In a July 22 article, Yevgenia Albats, editor of the opposition magazine Novoye vremya, or The New Times, issued an emotional call to the Russian elite to persuade Putin to change course in Ukraine or be left &.uot;without a country.&.uot;
&.uot;Never before in its post-Soviet history has Russia been in such a horrific position as it is now. All possibilities—from a major war to a junta in the Kremlin—are possible,&.uot; Albats wrote, adding that Putin's &.uot;Chekist entourage ... has led him not just into a dead end,&.uot; but also &.uot;into a nightmare in which he will go down in history as someone who has the blood of innocent children on his hands.&.uot;
Maybe somebody in high places actually heard her call.
This post appears courtesy of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.

Strong quake kills 367 in southern China

AP Photo: Xinhua, Hu Chao

In this photo taken by cellphone and released by China's Xinhua News Agency, men at rubbles of buildings look for survivors after an earthquake in Ludian County of Zhaotong City in southwest China's Yunnan Province Sunday, Aug. 3, 2014.

4 hr ago By JACK CHANG of Associated Press

BEIJING (AP) — A strong earthquake in southern China's Yunnan province toppled thousands of homes on Sunday, killing at least 367 people and injuring more than 1,800.

About 12,000 homes collapsed in Ludian, a densely populated county located around 366 kilometers (277 miles) northeast of Yunnan's capital, Kunming, China's official Xinhua News Agency reported.
The magnitude-6.1 quake struck at 4:30 p.m. at a depth of 10 kilometers (6 miles), according to the U.S. Geological Survey. Its epicenter was in Longtoushan township, 23 kilometers (14 miles) southwest of the city of Zhaotong, the Ludian county seat.
Ma Liya, a resident of Zhaotong, told Xinhua that the streets there were like a "battlefield after bombardment." She added that her neighbor's house, a new two-story building, had toppled, and said the quake was far worse than one that struck the area in 2012 and killed 81 people.
"The aftermath is much, much worse than what happened after the quake two years ago," Ma said. "I have never felt such strong tremors before. What I can see are all ruins."
Xinhua said at least 367 people were killed in the quake, with 1,881 injured.
Most of the deaths — 357 — were in Zhaotong City, Xinhua said. Another 10 people were killed in Quijing City.
News reports said rescuers were still trying to reach victims in more remote towns Sunday night.
Photos on Weibo, China's Twitter-like social media site, showed rescuers searching through flattened buildings and people injured amid toppled bricks.
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon offered "his condolences to the Chinese Government and the families of those killed," according to a statement from his office. The statement said the U.N. is ready to "lend its assistance to efforts to respond to humanitarian needs" and "to mobilize any international support needed."
Many of the homes that collapsed in Ludian, which has a population of about 429,000, were old and made of brick, Xinhua said, adding that electricity and telecommunications were cut off in the county.
The mountainous region where the quake occurred is largely agricultural, with farming and mining the top industries, and is prone to earthquakes.
Relief efforts were underway, with more than 2,500 troops dispatched to the disaster region, Xinhua said. The Red Cross Society of China allocated quilts, jackets and tents for those made homeless by the quake, while Red Cross branches in Hong Kong, Macau and neighboring Sichuan province also sent relief supplies.
Chinese state broadcaster CCTV said the quake was the strongest to hit Yunnan in 14 years.
In 1970, a magnitude-7.7 earthquake in Yunnan killed at least 15,000 people, and a magnitude-7.1 quake in the province killed more than 1,400 in 1974. In September 2012, 81 people died and 821 were injured in a series of quakes in the Yunnan region.
In May 2008, a powerful quake in Sichuan province left nearly 90,000 people dead or missing.
___
Associated Press researcher Henry Hou contributed to this report.

Israeli soldier thought captured is declared dead

AP Photo: Lefteris Pitarakis

Palestinian Seraj Ismail Abdel Al, 5, hurt in an overnight Israeli strike, looks at the damage to several buildings in Gaza City, northern Gaza Strip, Aug. 2.

41 min ago By IAN DEITCH and KARIN LAUB of Associated Press

JERUSALEM (AP) — An Israeli soldier the military feared had been abducted by Palestinian gunmen in a firefight that shattered a temporary ceasefire in Gaza has been declared dead, ending what could have been a nightmare scenario for Israel hours after it signaled it plans to scale back its operation against Hamas militants.

The military announced early Sunday that 23-year-old Hadar Goldin of the Givati infantry brigade had been killed in battle on Friday. Israel's defense minister, along with the chief military rabbi, met with the soldier's family at their home in the town of Kfar Saba.
Hundreds of well-wishers had gathered outside their home, praying and showing their support. There was an outpouring of grief when the military's announcement was made public.
Photo gallery: The Israel-Gaza conflict
"Prior to the decision, all medical considerations, religious observances, as well as additional relevant issues were taken into consideration," the military said.
The Israeli military had previously said it believed the soldier was grabbed in a Hamas ambush about an hour after an internationally brokered cease-fire took effect Friday morning. Hamas on Saturday distanced itself from the soldier's alleged capture, which had prompted widespread international condemnation. U.S. President Barack Obama, U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon and others had called for his immediate and unconditional release.
For Israel, the capture of a soldier or civilian by Palestinian militants is a nightmare scenario with far-reaching implications.
Israel has gone to great lengths in the past to get back its captured soldiers. In 2011, it traded over a thousand Palestinian prisoners, many involved in deadly attacks on civilians, for a single Israeli soldier who had been captured by Hamas-allied militants in 2006. The capture of two soldiers in a cross-border operation by Lebanon's Hezbollah gunmen in 2006 sparked a 34-day war between the Iranian-backed militant Shiite group and Israel.
Soon after the soldier was believed abducted on Friday, Israel conducted extensive searches in the territory and deployed heavy fire that killed scores of Palestinians.
On Saturday, Israel signaled it plans to scale back its military operation in Gaza and will not participate for now in any cease-fire negotiations in Cairo with Hamas. But the Islamic militant group suggested it won't hold its fire in the case of a unilateral Israeli pullout, raising the prospect of renewed hostilities in the future.
Israel continued to pound Gaza with airstrikes Saturday, killing at least 72 Palestinians, many in the southern border town of Rafah where Israeli troops searched for the soldier.
In a televised address, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu suggested that the Israeli military will reassess its Gaza operation once troops complete the demolition of Hamas tunnels under the Gaza-Israel border. Once the tunnels are demolished, "the military will prepare for continuing action in according to our security needs," he said, stressing all options remain on the table.

Hamas and Israel trade blame for truce failure

1 day ago Duration: 1:26 Views: 5k

"We promised to return the quiet to Israel and that is what we will do. We will continue to act until that goal is reached, however long it will take and with as much force needed," Netanyahu said. "Hamas needs to understand that it will pay an intolerable price as far as it is concerned for continuing to fire."
Since the Gaza war began July 8, at least 1,712 Palestinians, including many civilians, have been killed and more than 9,000 have been wounded, Palestinian health official Ashraf al-Kidra said. Israel has now lost 64 soldiers and three civilians, its highest death toll since its 2006 with Lebanon's Hezbollah. Hundreds of soldiers have been wounded.
Large swaths of Gaza have been destroyed and some 250,000 people have been forced to flee their homes. In Israel, much of the country has been exposed to Hamas rocket fire.
Earlier in the day, Cabinet Minister Yuval Steinitz said Israel won't send a delegation to proposed truce talks in Cairo for now. Speaking to Israel's Channel 10 television station, he alleged that Hamas repeatedly violated previous cease-fire deals.
"That leads us to the conclusion that with this organization there is no point in speaking about an agreement or a cease-fire because we have tried it too many times," Steinitz said.
Already, there were signs of troop redeployments in Gaza.
The Israeli military told residents of the northern Gaza town of Beit Lahiya that it would be safe for them to return to their homes. The area, from which Gaza militants had fired rockets at Israel in the past, came under heavy tank fire during Israel's ground operation, forcing thousands to flee.
Israeli troops and tanks also started a gradual pullback from the area east of the Gaza town of Khan Younis to the border with Israel, residents and police officials there said.
Israel ended a previous major military operation in Gaza more than five years ago with a unilateral pullback.
From an Israeli perspective, the advantage of a unilateral pullout or troop redeployment to the strip's fringes is that it can do so on its own terms, rather than becoming entangled in negotiations with Hamas. Hamas has said it will only halt fire if Israel and Egypt lift their seven-year-old border blockade of the territory.

AP Photo: YNet News

This undated photo shows Israeli Army 2nd. Lt. Hadar Goldin, from Kfar Saba, central Israel.

However, a unilateral pullback does not address the underlying causes of cross-border tensions and carries the risk of a new flare-up of violence in the future, a prospect underlined by defiant Hamas messages Saturday.
"We will continue to resist until we achieve our goals," Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhoum said after Netanyahu's speech, dismissing the Israeli leader's remarks as "confused."
Israel has said a main purpose of its Gaza operation is to seek and destroy tunnels dug by Hamas that stretch into the Jewish state. Israel views the tunnel network as a strategic threat intended to facilitate mass killing sprees on its civilians and soldiers.
Palestinian militants trying to sneak into Israel through the tunnels have been found with sedatives and handcuffs, an indication they were planning abductions, a tactic Hamas has used in the past.
Several soldiers have been killed in the current round of fighting by Palestinian gunmen who popped out of underground tunnels near Israeli communities along the Gaza border.
Many residents of the communities near the tunnel openings inside Israel have said they feel terrified.
Dealing with the tunnel threat is a serious challenge facing Israel after the current round of violence ends.
Meanwhile, the extent of destruction around Rafah became clear after intense Israeli shelling in response to Goldin's suspected capture killed 70 and wounded some 450. Entire apartment buildings in Rafah were flattened. Rescue teams sprayed water on charred rubble as families searched the wreckage for any salvageable belongings. Nearly two dozen bodies wrapped in bloodstained white cloth lay piled on the ground and the shelves of a cold storage room in a flower farm.
The farm's owner, Ghazi Hijazi, said the Health Ministry asked him to keep the bodies.
Imad Baroud, his wife and three kids fled by foot from their home near the Gaza-Egypt border to his parents' home in the center of Rafah to escape the shelling. He said his home was hit by artillery shells immediately after they left.
"The situation could not be described in words. The kids were yelling, they were scared, my wife was scared. I felt death was close," Baroud said.
Palestinian officials reported more than 150 Israeli airstrikes Saturday across Gaza, including several against mosques and one against the Hamas-linked Islamic University in Gaza City. Heavy shelling also continued along the border areas.
The Israeli military said it struck 200 targets over the previous 24 hours. It said it attacked five mosques that concealed weapons and that the Islamic University was being used as a research and weapons manufacturing site for Hamas. The claim could not be independently verified.
Gaza militants, meanwhile, fired about 90 rockets at Israel since midnight, according to the Israeli military. Seven were intercepted by Israel's rocket defense system, it said, while a mortar attack seriously injured a 70-year-old Israeli civilian.
___
Laub reported from Gaza City, Gaza Strip. Associated Press writers Ian Deitch and Yousur Alhelou in Jerusalem contributed to this report.

AP Photo: Lefteris Pitarakis

Smoke billows from the rubble of the Imam Al Shafaey mosque, destroyed in an overnight Israeli strike in Gaza City in the northern Gaza Strip, Aug. 2, 2014.

After slayings, mayor forms task force on homeless

AP Photo: Russell Contreras

Albuquerque Mayor Richard Berry speaks to reporters Thursday April 10, 2014, after the U.S. Justice Department released a report in response to a series of deadly Albuquerque police shootings. The report pointed to patterns of excessive force by the Albuquerque Police Department, serious constitutional violations and a lack of training and oversight of its officers.

9 hr ago By Associated Press

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — Following the brutal slayings of two homeless Navajo men, Albuquerque Mayor Richard Berry says he is forming a task force to address chronic homelessness among Native Americans in New Mexico's largest city.

Berry met with Navajo Nation President Ben Shelly and other tribal leaders last week. He says data the city has collected as part of its efforts to fight homelessness shows Native Americans are on the streets longer than other populations and are more likely to be victimized.
He says he and Shelly have agreed to work together to figure out why, and find solutions. And he says he will reach out to other pueblos as well.
Three teenagers are being held on murder charges in the attack weeks ago. One of the suspects told police the trio had been targeting homeless people around Albuquerque for a year.

One dead, 20 hospitalized from apparent overdoses at Maryland concert

1 hr ago By Brendan O'Brien of Reuters

(Reuters) - A North Carolina man died and 20 people were hospitalized due to apparent drug overdoses during a pop and dance music festival in Maryland, authorities said on Saturday.

Tyler Fox Viscardi, 20, of Raleigh, North Carolina, died after being taken to the hospital at 9 p.m. local time Friday after he attended an all-day Mad Decent Block Party festival in Columbia, about 20 miles (32 km) southwest of Baltimore, the Howard County Police Department said in a statement.

Authorities said Viscardi died of an apparent drug overdose, and investigators are working to determine what type of drugs were in his system.

A 17-year-old Virginia man, who attended the same event, was in critical condition suffering from what appears to be a drug overdose, according to the department.

Another 19 concert-goers were taken to the hospital during the event, also suffering from what authorities believe are drug overdoses.

The Mad Decent Block Party travels throughout the United States. Investigators said similar circumstances have unfolded at other Mad Decent Block Party events.

"We were shocked and saddened. ... Our hearts go out to everyone impacted," organizers said in a statement on the event's website.

Police said they issued 50 under-age drinking citations and made three arrests, including one for possession with intent to distribute marijuana, during the event.

(Reporting by Brendan O'Brien in Milwaukee; Editing by Mary Wisniewski and Leslie Adler)

Bones found near dictatorship torture chamber in Chile

Corbis: Alejandro Rustom, Demotix

​Memorial with names of victims who were subjected to human rights violations perpetrated by state agents during the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet.

1 hr ago By AFP

Human bones have been found near a military base in central Chile where political prisoners were tortured during the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet, officials said Friday.

"They are human remains, but what has not been determined yet is the date" of death, forensics director Patricio Bustos told journalists, saying specialists continued working in the area under heavy police guard.
He said the remains appeared to be from more than one person.
An estimated 3,200 people died or went missing during Chile's bloody 1973-1990 dictatorship. Another 38,000 were tortured under Pinochet, who died in 2006.
The bones were found on a farm near the Tejas Verdes military base outside the resort town of Santo Domingo on the central coast.
A judge had ordered a search in the area after receiving information that human remains were located there.
More than 100 people were held at Tejas Verdes after the coup that overthrew the leftist government of Salvador Allende on September 11, 1973.
The inmates were subjected to torture by agents of the military regime, according to Memoria Viva, an organization that tracks information on victims of the dictatorship.
The Association of Relatives of Detained and Disappeared (AFDD) said the location of the find strongly suggested a link to the dictatorship.
"We're talking about a spot that's very near, almost adjoining, the Tejas Verdes regiment, so that generates a lot of expectations about the case," said AFDD president Lorena Pizarro.

Pakistan mob kills woman, girls, over 'blasphemous' Facebook post

EPA: Muhammad Owais

Police arrive at the houses of Ahmadis after they were torched by a mob following accusations of blasphemy in Gujranwala, Pakistan.

4 days ago By Syed Raza Hassan of Reuters

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - A Pakistani mob killed a woman member of a religious sect and two of her granddaughters after a sect member was accused of posting blasphemous material on Facebook, police said Monday, the latest instance of growing violence against minorities.

The dead, including a seven-year-old girl and her baby sister, were Ahmadis, who consider themselves Muslim but believe in a prophet after Mohammed. A 1984 Pakistani law declared them non-Muslims and many Pakistanis consider them heretics.
Police said the late Sunday violence in the town of Gujranwala, 220 km (140 miles) southeast of the capital, Islamabad, started with an altercation between young men, one of whom was an Ahmadi accused of posting "objectionable material".
"Later, a crowd of 150 people came to the police station demanding the registration of a blasphemy case against the accused," said one police officer who declined to be identified.
"As police were negotiating with the crowd, another mob attacked and started burning the houses of Ahmadis."
The youth accused of making the Facebook post had not been injured, he said.
Under Pakistani law, Ahmadis are banned from using Muslim greetings, saying Muslim prayers or referring to his place of worship as a mosque.
Salim ud Din, a spokesman for the Ahmadi community, said it was the worst attack on the community since simultaneous attacks on Ahmadi places of worship killed 86 Ahmadis four years ago.
"Police were there but just watching the burning. They didn't do anything to stop the mob," he said. "First they looted their homes and shops and then they burnt the homes."
The police officer said they had tried to stop the mob.
Accusations of blasphemy are rocketing in Pakistan, from one in 2011 to at least 68 last year, according to the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan. About 100 people have been accused of blasphemy this year.
Human rights workers say the accusations are increasingly used to settle personal vendettas or to grab the property of the accused.
(Additional reporting, writing by Katharine Houreld; Editing by Robert Birsel)

Evacuees return after Taiwan gas explosions

AP Photo

A relative, right, of a victim in the multiple explosions from an underground gas leak is consoled at a funeral parlor in Kaohsiung, Taiwan, Friday, Aug. 1.

4 hr ago By GLADYS TSAI of Associated Press

KAOHSIUNG, Taiwan (AP) — Hundreds of people who fled from gas pipeline explosions in Taiwan's second-largest city returned to their homes Friday after authorities said there was no more risk of blasts like the series that ripped apart streets overnight, killing 26 people and injuring 267.

AP Photo: Wally Santana

Damaged vehicles lie in the rubble on Friday, Aug. 1, after massive gas explosions in Kaohsiung, Taiwan, late Thursday evening.

With clean-up work underway in the 2-square kilometer (1-square mile) area, investigators were turning to the task of determining the cause of the blasts, the industrial city's worst such disaster in 16 years.
Most of the four ruptured street sections in the densely populated district of Kaohsiung were declared safe from further explosions by afternoon, a city spokesman said. A fire in a 10-meter (yard) -long section that burned through the night had also been put out.
Five explosions ripped through four streets starting around midnight Thursday, catapulting cars into the air and blasting cement rubble at passers-by, many of whom were out late at a nearby night market.
That came about three hours after a gas leak had been reported on Kaixuan Road, but emergency services had been unable to locate the source.
Four firefighters were among the victims and two were missing, while at least six fire trucks were flung into the rubble. The blasts sent flames shooting into the sky and left broad, meter-deep (yard-deep) trenches down the middle of roads.
Many of the injured were still receiving medical treatment. The disaster was Taiwan's second in as many weeks following the crash of a TransAsia Airways prop jet on the island of Penghu on July 23 that killed 48 people and injured 10.
"Last night around midnight, the house started shaking and I thought it was a huge earthquake, but when I opened the door, I saw white smoke all over and smelled gas," said Chen Qing-tao, 38, who lives a short distance from the devastation.
The explosions were believed caused by leaking propene, a petrochemical material not intended for public use, said Chang Jia-juch, director of the Central Disaster Emergency Operation Center.
Propene is mainly used for making the plastic polypropylene used in a wide variety of packaging, caps and films. It can be detected by its mildly unpleasant smell.
The city's Environmental Protection Bureau director told Taiwan's Central News Agency that propene was leaking from the gas pipes that exploded. It originated from a warehouse used by China General Terminal & Distribution Corp., which stores and transports petrochemical raw materials, Director Chen Chin-der told the news agency.
Industrial-use pipelines run through Kaohsiung's residential neighborhoods because industry preceded the construction of houses, said city spokesman Ting Yun-kung. The port city contains much of Taiwan's heavy industry, especially petrochemicals.
Video from broadcasters showed residents searching for victims overnight in shattered storefronts and rescuers placing injured people on stretchers. Numerous fires sent smoke pouring into the night sky above the Chian-Chen district, where factories operate near low-rise residential buildings.
The government's disaster response center spent much of Friday trying to prevent secondary explosions. With the risk easing after midday, all but 300 evacuees had left emergency shelters and just one of an initial nine remained open, Ting said.
The Central News Agency's English-language service said 12,000 people were sent to emergency shelters, but its Chinese service put the figure at 1,200, which is close to the city's earliest estimates.
Area resident Chang Bi-chu, 63, described seeing dead bodies along the roadside. "I felt really bad. After all, there just was the air crash in Penghu last week."
Chang said the front door of her home was warped by the explosion and power was cut, leaving the house without lights or fans in the steamy weather.
"We don't have money to stay in a hotel and they're all booked anyway," she said.
Power supplies to 12,000 people in the area were severed, and 23,600 lost gas service. Some power had been restored by late Friday.
Backhoes pulled upended fire trucks and other vehicles from the rubble while paramedics with rescue dogs combed the neighborhood for survivors.
Rescuers expected to find few, if any, people in the rubble because no buildings collapsed, said Hsu Lee-hao, a national emergency operations center official.
Large trenches edged with pavement slabs torn apart by the blasts dominated the area, which was cordoned off most of Friday. Burned walls and toppled shop signs lined Sanduo Road, near an elementary school. Television images showed one car thrust onto a building roof by a particularly powerful blast.
Taiwanese Premier Jiang Yi-huah announced that all flags would fly at half-staff for three days from Aug. 5 in honor of the victims of both the Penghu air crash and Kaohsiung explosion. President Ma Ying-jeou paused at a scheduled event Friday morning to call for a minute of silence.
Much of the drama was captured on closed-circuit television, dashboard cameras and cellphones.
A video showed an explosion rippling through the floor of a motorcycle parking area, hurling concrete and other debris through the air. Cellphone video captured the sound of an explosion as flames leapt at least 9 meters (30 feet) into the air.
One witness said he tried to help before paramedics arrived.
"I was on my scooter just across the street, suddenly there was the explosion, a white car was blown toward me, and I saw the driver trapped in the car," said Wong Zhen-yao, 49, owner of a car repair shop in the disaster area.
"There was still fire nearby. I tried to pull the guy out but couldn't," he said. "Only after the smoke was gone did I realize there was such a big hole in the middle of the road."