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The European Court of Human Rights has ruled that Russia failed to protect the hostages of the Beslan school siege in which about 330 people died in 2004. In the siege, Chechen rebels took more than 1,000 hostages, mostly children. The operation by Russian forces to end it used disproportionate force, the court added. It also said that officials knew an attack was imminent but did not act.

In a front page cover bearing resemblance to the infamous Nazi poster Eternal Jew, Bosnian Muslim newspaper Novi Horizonti is accusing Jews and Serbs of conspiring against Islam and comparing both Jews and Serbs to habitual killers of Muslims in Palestine and Bosnia. "So, what is that which connects Serbian nationalists and Zionists?" asks Novi Horizonti. On the left, latest edition of Bosnian Muslim magazine Novi Horizonti. On the right, Hitler's poster Eternal Jew. Both show an image of Orthodox Jewish dress and both accuse of Zionist conspiracy. "Surely, the only common thread that connects those two non connectable categories...

Belgrade - Serbian Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica Thursday called on Western powers to withdraw the latest UN draft resolution paving the way for Kosovo's independence. Kostunica again pointed to Russia's support which Belgrade has had in its bid to block the formal separation of what only nominally remains Serbia's province with an Albanian majority. "Owing to Russia's principled position, it is clear that a resolution blatantly violating the most basic principles of international law," he said in a statement. The draft tabled by US, Great Britain and France, proposed a 120- day delay for a new round of talks of...

Jakob Finci, the leader of Sarajevo's small Jewish community, has asked the European Court of Human Rights to lift the prohibition on Jews and other minorities running for the Bosnian presidency. Under the country's post-war constitution, only Bosnian Serbs and Croats, who are overwhelmingly Catholic and Christian Orthodox, respectively, and Bosniaks, who are Muslim, are allowed to run for presidency. Bosnia has three presidents, each representing one of Bosnia's principal constituent groups. "We understand that Mr. Finci wants the equal right to vote and be voted for, but unfortunately this is not the case," Bosnia's ambassador to Israel, Nedeljko Maslesa,...

WASHINGTON -- Agim Ceku said that the Kosovo status solution will end the strife of Serbia and the Kosovo Serbs. In an article the Kosovo Prime Minister wrote, published by the Washington Post today, he writes that Kosovo needs independence in order to start working on its economic potential and European integration. “Above all, Kosovo’s final status will end the insecurity and strife of the Kosovo Serbs and Serbia. It will free Serbia of its mythological burden and open the doors for real politics and economic development.” Ceku said. He said that Kosovo is doing everything it can to help...

PRIŠTINA -- Beta has learned that the announced meeting between the Kosovo team and the UN envoy Martti Ahtisaari has been cancelled. Martti Ahtisaari (FoNet) Although a new round of talks was announced after the end of the three-hour meeting last evening, sources close to the negotiating team today said the meeting has been cancelled. The stumbling blocks seem to be the number of Serb municipalities and the decentralization talks. The Serb negotiators have in the meanwhile asked the UN Special Envoy Martti Ahtisaari to clarify his statement that “Serbs were guilty as a people”, and warned him that claims...

Taking the plan's provisions as a starting point, the Transnistrian "experts" and "political analysts", as well as their Moscow and Kiev colleagues who back them, reason the resemblance between Kosovo and the Transnistrian conflict. Note: a Russian polit-technologist, Stanislav Belkovskiy, stated that the Republic of Moldova, or, as he said, Bessarabia, is a non-viable state, infected with the unionist virus, and which and dreams with open eyes about how to get into Romania's arms more quickly. Unlike "Bessarabia", Belkovskiy wrote, Transnistria has set up not only a viable statehood, but also (!) "a Transnistrian nation", who has the right to...

Israeli officials convened emergency meetings on Thursday to decide how to respond to the militant Hamas group's upset victory in Palestinian elections, maintaining an outward silence while privately blaming each other for the upheaval. Hamas' stunning showing in Wednesday's vote could send tremors through Israel's own political establishment ahead of March elections by bolstering hawks who oppose territorial concessions to the Palestinians. 'snip' "After Hamas is elected, can the world not talk to them?" former Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom told Army Radio. "The world will speak to them saying that they were elected in a democratic process ... I think...

Subject: Good Post I don't remember the name of the AOL member who wrote this post . However , he has given a great deal of thought to the only solution we in America face against Islamofacism . The author of this post should be given spots on Larry King , CNBC , Fox News Network , ABC , CBS , NBC , BBC , and most of all AL JAZEERA . "To get out of a difficulty, one usually must go through it. Our country is now facing the most serious threat to its existence, as we know it,...

Nothing more so far. Previously reported a loud blast shook northern suburb of Beirut.

<p>The general commanding four loyalist columns moving on Madrid during Spain's civil war (1936-39) referred to his militant supporters within the capital as his "fifth column."</p> <p>Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union maintained fifth columns in the United States. These were groups of secret sympathizers, sleeper cells, or supporters of an enemy that engage in espionage or sabotage, or simply disinform about the attacker's intentions.</p>

By JoAnn Magnuson Jews and Christians share, as Martin Buber so succinctly put it, "a book and an expectation." The interpretations of the Book and the details of the expectation vary widely, but there is a common source code for both communities. In our generation, many Christians have been rediscovering the Jewish roots of their family tree and finding in that root system a sense of reconnection to the land and people of Israel. This rediscovery effort has caused many, particularly within the Evangelical churches, to take a fresh look at the very Jewish world of Jesus and the...