News Briefs
BY Wire Reports
Sunday, October 07, 2012
10/07/12 at 2:45 AM
Jerusalem: Israel shoots down drone that entered its airspace
Israel scrambled fighter jets to intercept a drone Saturday that crossed deep into Israeli airspace from the Mediterranean Sea, shooting the aircraft down over the country's southern desert, the military said.
The incident marked the first time in at least six years that a hostile aircraft has penetrated Israel's airspace, and Israeli officials said they were taking the incident seriously, raising the possibility of retaliatory action.
It was not immediately clear who launched the drone, but suspicion quickly fell on the Lebanese Islamic militant group Hezbollah. The Iranian-backed group is known to have sent drones into Israeli airspace on several previous occasions.
The drone, which was downed near the Yatir Forest close to the West Bank, had spent about 20 minutes in Israeli airspace, an Israeli military official said on condition of anonymity in line with protocol.
Madrid: Thousands protest austerity measures
Several thousand people marched in downtown Madrid on Saturday to protest austerity measures they say will lead to cuts in cherished national health care and the privatization of public services.
Marching under banners reading "Neither cuts nor privatizations," many protesters were civil servants hit with a wage freeze next year.
Spain is experiencing its second recession in three years, is burdened with an unemployment rate of nearly 25 percent, and social unrest is on the rise.
"I work in a hospital, but I'm about to end up unemployed," 58-year-old nurse Victoria Gutierrez said. "On Oct. 30, my temporary contract will finish and it won't be extended."
Paris: Anti-terror sweep leads to 11 arrests, one death
Police carried out raids across France on Saturday after DNA on a grenade that exploded last month at a kosher grocery store led them to a suspected jihadist cell of young Frenchmen recently converted to Islam.
The man whose DNA was identified, named by police as Jeremy Sydney, was killed by police after he opened fire on them, slightly wounding three officers in the eastern city of Strasbourg. Officials said he had been under surveillance since last spring - around the time a French Islamist went on a shooting rampage against a Jewish school and French soldiers, killing seven people.
Eleven other suspects were arrested across the country Saturday, according to the Sipa news agency.
Paris prosecutor Francois Molins said all the arrested suspects were French and recent converts to Islam. Four of the men involved in the raid had written wills.
Wayne, N.J.: 23 people on tour bus injured in N.J. crash
A tour bus from Canada carrying about 60 people bound for New York City overturned on a highway exit ramp in northern New Jersey early Saturday, slid down an embankment and landed on its side, injuring 23 people on board, authorities said.
The driver, who suffered a gash in his arm, told state police that he was cut off by another vehicle, though it was not immediately clear whether that caused the crash around 7:30 a.m. on eastbound Interstate 80 in Wayne.
Some windows burst during the crash and their frames pinned three people, but they were quickly freed and taken to hospitals with the other injured. The bus had been chartered by a church group.
State police have said none of the injuries is considered life-threatening.
Timbuktu, Mali: Women forced to wear veils protest tactics
A resident says about 200 women have marched in protest in the Malian city of Timbuktu, where Islamists are requiring women to wear veils.
Mahi Toure said the Islamists fired shots into the air Saturday morning to disperse the women protesting against the man in charge of implementing veil requirements.
The women accuse Mohamed Mossa of carrying out abusive arrests since the Islamists began enforcing their interpretation of Islamic Shariah law. Women have been subjected to curfews, and have been publicly whipped for failing to wear veils. It's also forbidden for them to be in the streets with men who aren't their husbands or relatives.
The Islamists now control an area as large as France in the north of Mali.
Associated Images:
People walk by election campaign posters of President Hugo Chavez and a picture of independence hero Simon Bolivar on Saturday in Caracas, Venezuela. Chavez is running for re-election against opposition candidate Henrique Capriles in Sunday's presidential election. RODRIGO ABD / The Associated Press
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