World Watch

ISRAEL
Patching Together A New Coalition
If politics is always local, it’s also almost always petty. The breakup of Israel’s National Unity governing coalition was, on the face of it, a battle of principle over West Bank settlements. Labor Party leader Binyamin Ben-Eliezer said he quit because Prime Minister Ariel Sharon wouldn’t reallocate $145 million in funding for West Bank settlements to poor towns inside Israel proper. But Ben-Eliezer’s public pronouncements were a pretext for the Defense Minister to recast himself as a liberal in advance of a party leadership battle this month. Ben-Eliezer has often been tougher on the Palestinians even than bullish Sharon, and many Labor Party members don’t like it. Sharon was left to rue the loss of the international legitimacy Labor bestowed on his hard-line policy toward the Palestinians. Now, when world leaders criticize him for a heavy hand against Palestinians, he will not be able to dispatch Foreign Minister Shimon Peres to calm them down. So long as Peres, architect of the Oslo peace process, remained, there was hope Sharon might return to negotiations with the Palestinians. That looks a dim prospect now. The best hope Sharon has of preserving his government and staving off elections is to bring on board the right-wing National Union-Yisrael Beitenu. Sharon officials say that will not radicalize the government’s policies, but a party whose leadership is dotted with advocates of the “transfer” of Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza is not exactly going to buff up Sharon’s international image. Ben-Eliezer, meanwhile, faces a challenge to his leadership from two young Labor doves in party primaries on Nov. 19. Had he faced them as Defense Minister, with Israeli troops surrounding every town in the West Bank, polls showed he would have been out on his ear; his chances are now somewhat improved but by no means certain. Sharon, too, faces a challenge to his hold on the Likud Party at a Central Committee meeting on Nov. 14. His candidate for party president is up against a nominee backed by former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is just waiting for an opportunity to confront Sharon. Sharon has offered Netanyahu the Foreign Ministry vacated by Peres. That forces Netanyahu to either hitch his wagon to Sharon or lose face among the party faithful by declining to step up in a moment of crisis. — By Matt Rees/Jerusalem

MIDDLE EAST
Warning Shot In Jordan
Authorities have few leads in the hunt for the killer of U.S. aid official Laurence Foley in Amman, but they say an al-Qaeda connection is a possibility. Pro-U.S. Jordan is one of Osama bin Laden’s stated enemies, and his followers were active there even before Sept. 11. On Dec. 31, 1999, Jordan security agents foiled an al-Qaeda plan to blow up tourist establishments. At least 10 members of the group are currently on trial in Jordanian courts. Raed Hijazi, an American-Jordanian convicted in Amman earlier this year for plotting to attack Israeli tourists, trained in Afghanistan camps associated with bin Laden. And last month, Washington expressed concern that al-Qaeda was planning to kidnap Americans in Jordan.

ITALY
The Casual Cruelty Of Nature
The children of the small southern Italian town of San Giuliano di Puglia were celebrating Halloween at school when the earthquake struck, reducing the building to rubble and killing 29, including two women and an entire class of six-year-olds. Rescue workers pulled at least 34 alive from the debris. State prosecutors went to the town to determine whether to bring negligence charges in connection with the school collapse, since most other buildings in San Giuliano remained standing.

BRITAIN
Massive Manhunt
Police confirmed that a 14-year-old girl was the tenth victim of a serial rapist, whose previous victims ranged from 10 to 52 years. At least 100 officers from five police forces were on the trail of the man whose attacks began in southeast England in November of last year. The search for the Trophy Rapist is the largest of its kind in the U.K. since the capture of the Yorkshire Ripper in 1981.

CHECHNYA
Confession Time
Chechen guerrilla leader Shamil Basayev announced on a rebel website that he was responsible for the mass hostage taking in Moscow. Basayev said he had not informed his leader, Chechen President Aslan Maskhadov. Earlier in Copenhagen, acting on an Interpol warrant issued in Russia, Danish police arrested Akhmed Zakayev, a senior envoy of Maskhadov. Zakayev was attending the World Chechen Congress, which Russia had tried to prevent. Moscow pressed for Zakayev’s extradition, saying he was involved in terrorist acts between 1996 and 1999 and may have been involved in last month’s theater siege.

AFGHANISTAN
Going Home
Afghan President Hamid Karzai said he would send investigators to the prison camp at Guantnamo Bay after the U.S. decided that three Afghan detainees had no terrorist links and freed them. The men were among at least 600 held there. One of the freed men, Haji Faiz Mohammed, claimed to be 105 years old, though the U.S. said he was 71.

ZAMBIA
Political Maize
Zambia refused genetically modified grain from the World Food Program, despite the fact that 3 million of its people face famine. The government said the decision was made after scientists looked into the effects on health and the environment of importing GM crops. Zambia’s opposition claimed that people will die as a result of the decision.

SOUTH AFRICA
White Hatred
Nine bombs exploded in the black township of Soweto near Johannesburg, killing one woman and damaging a mosque, a Buddhist temple and railway lines. President Thabo Mbeki blamed the attacks on White extremists and warned that they could mark the start of a terrorist campaign to destabilize the country. In the past three months, police have arrested 23 Afrikaners on suspicion of involvement in a plot to restore white rule.

INDIA
Hope Springs
The veteran politician Mufti Muhammad Sayeed became chief minister of Indian-administered Kashmir. Sayeed’s election provides a new opportunity for peace in the state, which has been racked by violence since 1989. He promised to investigate custodial killings and human-rights abuses in an effort to end local militancy.

SRI LANKA
Cage for a Tiger
A court sentenced in absentia the military leader of the Tamil Tiger separatists, Velupillai Prabhakaran, to 200 years in jail for a bomb attack in 1996. The judgment coincided inconveniently with a breakthrough in peace talks between the government and the Tigers: they agreed to set up a body to appeal for aid to rebuild areas ravaged by the 19-year civil war. The head of the government negotiators said Prabhakaran’s sentence was a judicial matter and would not affect the talks.

INDONESIA
Trail Warm
Police released sketches of three men they want to question about the Bali bombing. The images were drawn from the evidence of witnesses who said they saw three men at the site of the nightclub attack shortly before the explosions. Forensic evidence suggests the bombs were triggered by electronic devices or remote control, rather than by suicide bombers. Police said they were already on the trail of one of the bombers after they raided a house and found a photograph matching one of the sketches. Investigators also said the three suspects could be part of a larger group of 10.

MEANWHILE
Wannabe Sniper
London police believe the Washington snipers provided inspiration for a British copycat. He uses an air rifle instead of a Bushmaster XM-15, so his victims suffer no more than stinging wounds. Still, he has hit six people, including Terry Rooney, a Labour M.P., and police have few clues to his identity.