Egypt seizes weapons 'bound for Gaza'

President Obama Appeals to Israelis to Make Peace with Palestinians In an emotional speech to hundreds of university students, President Obama urged young Israelis to push their government to re-launch peace talks with the Palestinians, arguing it is the only way to ensure the future of Israeli democracy.

The Egyptian defence minister who oversaw the so-called War of Attrition with Israel that followed the loss of the Sinai peninsula in the Six-Day War of 1967 died on Saturday at the age of 88.A staunch supporter of the pan-Arab socialism of president Gamal Abdel Nasser, Amin Huweidi fell foul of his successor Anwar Sadat and spent a decade under house arrest.But he was still given a military funeral in the Armed Forces Mosque in Cairo on Saturday, the official MENA news agency reported. It gave no cause of death.

RAMALLAH, West Bank — U.S. President Barack Obama is meeting Palestinian officials on the second day of his Mideast tour to emphasize the importance of reaching an Israeli-Palestinian peace deal, a message underscored Thursday when Palestinian militants in Gaza launched rockets into southern Israel.

Victims found shot at point-blank range on the banks of Quweiq River in the Syrian city of Aleppo, the opposition Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said in an e- mail. The group said the men were mostly 20-30 years old and had bullet wounds to the head. It said some had their hands tied. Another activist group, the Local Coordination Committees, said 80 bodies were recovered from the scene.

Nicaraguan police have seized a large cache of weapons and explosives from suspected members of Mexico's Sinaloa drug cartel after a police car chase outside Managua, a spokeswoman said.The weapons included 61 automatic rifles, mostly AK-47's and four M-16s, two grenade launchers, 10 hand grenades, 20 sticks of dynamite and more than 19,000 rounds of ammunition, Vilma Reyes told a press briefing.They were found inside a car the suspected drug traffickers fled from after being chased by police on the Panamerican highway, outside Managua, she added.

Israel has granted a U.S. company the first license to explore for oil and gas in the occupied Golan Heights, John Reed of the Financial Times reports.

An elderly Arab woman approaches a young Israeli woman at a garbage dump. They have no common language, yet somehow they interact. Called “Take-away,” the play is set in a garbage dump on what used to be a sacred hill. A group of garbage collectors, all refugees from conflicts, live on the hill. They sort through the garbage that is dumped and in so doing, learn about each other.

Egyptian police arrested an Israeli dirt biker who illegally crossed the border on Saturday, a security official said.The 36-year-old man, who led police on a chase after he crossed into the Sinai Peninsula, told them he entered Egypt by mistake after he was separated from his fellow bikers.Last month, Egyptian police detained an Israeli journalist after he tried to cross the border with an African illegal migrant. The Channel 10 reporter was released a week later.