Latest related: Israel Absolves Itself
"Israel charges 2 Palestinians in American’s fatal stabbing" by Matti Friedman, Associated Press / January 27, 2011
JERUSALEM — Israeli authorities indicted two Palestinians yesterday in the killing of an American woman late last year, saying the men had confessed to the crime and were also linked to another death and attacks aimed at Israelis.
Was it under torture?
Kristine Luken, 44, was stabbed to death in December while hiking with a friend in a forest outside Jerusalem. Her attackers killed her because they believed Luken, a Christian missionary, was Jewish, according to the indictment.
Related: Arabs Stab American in Israel
The killing drew attention in Israel, coming at a time of relative quiet and taking place in a popular hiking spot not far from Jerusalem. Weeks of official silence following Luken’s death added to the mystery.
Police said they had the suspects in custody within a day of the killing but imposed a gag order when they realized the men were linked to a longer string of attacks and other crimes, including robberies and rape.
The order was lifted yesterday when the two suspects, along with a third accused in the slaying of an Israeli woman in early 2010, were led into a Jerusalem court in orange jumpsuits and leg shackles. All three were in their early 30s.
Luken, involved with the Church’s Ministry Among Jewish People, a group that promotes Christianity, lived for most of the last two decades in Virginia.
On Dec. 17, the the idictment says, Kifah Ghneimat and Iyad Fatafa “decided to enter Israel illegally in order to kill Jews’’ and attacked the two women.
The indictment shows the motives were nationalistic, said prosecutor Joey Asch.
And therefore the Palestinians can never have a state, right?
Of course, dumping WMD on them and firing tank shells into apartment buildings is fine if the motive if Zionist nationalism.
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I'll give it one more try:
"Peace deal was near in ’08, former Israeli leader says " by New York Times / January 28, 2011
JERUSALEM — In excerpts from the memoirs published yesterday in the Israeli newspaper Yediot Aharonot, and in an interview with The New York Times, Ehud Olmert, the former prime minister of Israel, provides details to the Al-Jazeera television network of Palestinian documents with minutes from related meetings.
Olmert said the two sides had agreed on key principles: the state of Palestine would have no military; a US-led international security force, not Israeli soldiers, would be stationed on its border with Jordan; Jerusalem would be shared, with its holy sites overseen by a multinational committee; and a limited number of Palestinian refugees would be permitted back into what is now Israel, while the rest would be generously compensated.
No other nation on earth is told it can not have a military.
Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, confirmed most of Olmert’s account in an interview....
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And as Egypt and the snow have dominated the Globe's pages:
Israeli warplane pounds Gaza tunnel
