Shorts: Mideast

Sharon's son goes on trial

jerusalem (jta) | The trial of Ariel Sharon's son on corruption charges began.

State prosecutors filed an indictment last week against Omri Sharon in Tel Aviv Magistrate's Court, charging him with fraud, false testimony and obstruction of justice in connection with his father's 1999 run for the Likud Party leadership.

Omri Sharon has admitted to exceeding regulations on funding for the primary and said it was solely his responsibility. Attorney General Menachem Mazuz decided not to prosecute the prime minister in the case. Omri Sharon faces a maximum jail term of seven years if convicted, but legal sources said the court probably would be asked to sentence him to around nine months behind bars.




More West Bank settlements to go

jerusalem (jta) | Ariel Sharon said Israel could remove more West Bank settlements for peace with the Palestinians.

"Not all of today's settlements in Judea and Samaria will remain once we complete the final stage of the road map," the prime minister told Israel Channel 10 television this week, referring to the U.S.-led peace plan. Sharon did not specify how many settlements in the West Bank, beyond the four evacuated this month, would be torn down.

But Sharon said that major West Bank settlements would stay under Israel's control.




Bush pushes Abbas on terrorism

jerusalem (jta) | President Bush reiterated a call for Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to crack down on terrorism.

Bush praised Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon for the recent Gaza withdrawal, saying this week in an Arizona speech, "It took political courage to make that decision." He added, "And now it's going to take political courage by the Palestinians."




Report: Israeli troops lack protection

jerusalem (jta) | Too few Israeli soldiers are issued with bulletproof vests, an internal report found.

The state comptroller´s report on Israel´s security apparatus, issued this week, took the army to task for equipping no more than 40 percent of its combat troops with body armor capable of stopping rifle bullets.

When Israeli-Palestinian fighting peaked in 2002 and 2003, many soldiers complained of a lack of body armor, prompting their families and even foreign Jewish donors to supply it. At the time, then-state Comptroller Eliezer Goldberg called on the army to make bulletproof vests available to all relevant personnel.




American immigrant sets himself on fire in Jerusalem

jerusalem (jta) | A 30-year-old American immigrant set himself on fire outside his Jerusalem ulpan this week, critically injuring himself, in protest over Israel's pullout from Gaza, police and rescue officials said.

The single Jewish man, who moved to Israel last year and was studying Hebrew at

the city's Ulpan Etzion, was gravely injured in the afternoon incident, suffering from first-degree burns on 70 percent of his body.

Witnesses told the Jerusalem Post that the victim, who was identified by his Hebrew name, Baruch Ben-Menachem, had put a blanket around himself and doused himself with gasoline.

A security guard who first noticed smoke coming out of the courtyard of the ulpan began putting out the flames on the man's burning body with a fire extinguisher, Jerusalem police spokesman Shmuel Ben-Ruby said.




Protester dies from self-inflicted wounds

jerusalem (jta) | An Israeli woman who set herself on fire to protest the Gaza Strip withdrawal died.

The 54-year-old West Bank resident succumbed last week to injuries sustained Aug. 7 when she doused herself with kerosene and lit her body at a police checkpoint outside Gaza.

Police described the incident as a protest suicide. The woman was to be buried in her home settlement of Kedumim. She was the only Israeli fatality linked to the withdrawal from Gaza and the northern West Bank.




Sun bathing soldiers punished

jerusalem (jta) | Four Israeli female soldiers were disciplined for sunbathing during the Gaza Strip withdrawal.

The soldiers, all officer cadets, stripped to their underwear to take in some sun during a break in the evacuation of Gaza's Rafiah Yam settlement earlier this month.

Although there were no civilians around at the time, their conduct was deemed unbecoming and all four were suspended from the officer's course, the army said this week.




Ex-Iraqi Jews want compensation

jerusalem (jta) | Iraqi Jewish leaders from around the world will demand compensation from the Iraqi government for lost assets.

Meetings have been scheduled for Sept. 18-19 in London to discuss the issue of compensation for Jews who fled Arab countries during and after the creation of the State of Israel and were forced to leave behind their assets, the Jerusalem Post reported.