The Fatah Reference Secretary in the West Bank, Hussein al Sheikh, speaking to Albawaba.com, confirmed that Palestinian cabinet minister Hassan Asfour was hospitalized Monday evening in a Ramallah hospital after five masked people beat him. The identity of these people or their motives are unknown. Asfour, minister of nongovernmental organizations affairs, was taken to hospital with light injuries. "This is a cowardly and dirty assault against minister Asfour," Yasser Arafat's aide, Ahmed Abdel-Rahman, told Reuters at the hospital. "The leadership considers this assault as a criminal act aimed against the Palestinian legitimacy and intended to create sedition among Palestinians," he...