Free Republic

A British aid worker was killed Friday in a U.N. compound in the West Bank during a gunbattle between Israeli troops and Palestinian gunmen — the first senior U.N. official to die in over two years of fighting. The United Nations accused Israeli soldiers of preventing an ambulance from immediately reaching Iain Hook, a senior manager for UNRWA, the U.N. agency that helps Palestinian refugees. The Israeli army said he was evacuated from the U.N. compound in the Jenin refugee camp as soon as possible. The death occurred hours after Israel reoccupied the West Bank town of Bethlehem for the...

Palestinian security forces in Ramallah on Monday arrested a suspect in the murder of Samir Rantisi, a local journalist and spokesman for former PA Information Minister Yasser Abed Rabbo. Rantisi, 42, had for years urged Palestinians to endorse non-violent methods in their confrontation with Israel and was strongly opposed to suicide bombings. He was murdered early Monday morning while he was sleeping in his bedroom in the Sateh Marhaba neighborhood. A lone gunman who broke into his apartment in the Shkukani Building shot him twice in the head in front of his wife. The wife managed to identify the suspect,...

Nov. 25, 2002 Beilin, Abed Rabbo come up with draft peace plan By MATTHEW GUTMAN The Palestinians are willing to give up on the right of return in exchange for Israel's symbolic acceptance of its "responsibility" for the refugee problem and a token number of returnees, according to an unofficial draft for a final peace accord, drawn up by former Justice Minister Yossi Beilin and the Palestinian Minister for Information Yasser Abed Rabbo. The unfinished document, leaked just days after Labor Chairman Amram Mitzna indicated his willingness to negotiation with Yasser Arafat, is based along the lines of the Clinton...