Germany: Assisted suicide OK if patient consents

KARLSRUHE, Germany: Terminally ill patients on life support should have the right to die if they want to, Germany’s highest civil court said on Friday in a landmark ruling on assisted suicide.

Read the original here:
Germany: Assisted suicide OK if patient consents

US worst again in healthcare: Study

NEW YORK: While Americans spend on health care twice as much as other countries in the developed world, they get less health services in a less equitable system.

View original here: 
US worst again in healthcare: Study

Israel air raid kills two in Gaza

GAZA CITY: Two Palestinians were killed in Israeli air strikes against targets in the Gaza Strip, Palestinian medical workers said on Friday.

More:
Israel air raid kills two in Gaza

Israeli Planes Strike Targets in Gaza

GAZA: Israeli planes carried out air strikes against targets in the Gaza Strip on Sunday, injuring seven Palestinians, Palestinian medical workers said.

An army spokesman said the strikes, which occurred after a rocket fired from the Hamas-run enclave landed in Israel, had targeted two factories in the central and northern Gaza used to make weapons and a smuggling tunnel under the border with Egypt.

Palestinian witnesses and medical workers said the targets included a metal foundry in the central Gaza Strip, a caravan in the north and smuggling tunnels in the south.

The attacks occurred one day after Hamas said it had reached an agreement with smaller armed groups in the territory to halt sporadic rocket fire towards Israel, which often responds with air strikes.

The army spokesman said the air strikes were in response to a rocket fired from the Gaza Strip on Saturday. It landed near the city of Sderot, causing no injuries or damage, he said.

Calm along the Israel-Gaza frontier has been largely maintained since Israel ended a 22-day war against Hamas in the territory in January with the aim of halting daily rocket fire.

The Israeli military usually responds to sporadic rocket attacks by launching air strikes against tunnels under the Egyptian border used to smuggle goods and weapons into Gaza.

Egypt has been trying to mediate a prisoner exchange between Israel and Hamas that would include the release of a captured Israeli soldier held in Gaza since 2006 in return for hundreds of Palestinians jailed in Israel.

---

Israeli Planes Strike Targets in Gaza was first posted on November 22, 2009 at 11:17 am.