(Reuters) Insurgents of the Ansar a-Din group in Iraq have kidnapped two Palestinians, Nabil George Yaakob Razuq and Ahmed Yassin Tikati, and accused them of spying for Israel, Iran's Al-Alam television reported Thursday. "We have captured spies who belong to the Zionist enemy, and we demand the immediate release of all the prisoners who belong to the religious factions," said a masked man in a videotape. Razuq had been attending Augusta College in Georgia and worked for RTI, a non-profit organization with a local governance contract in Iraq from the U.S. Agency for International Development. Israeli cabinet minister Gideon Ezra said while both men were residents of east Jerusalem, "they are not Israeli citizens." Palestinians from east Jerusalem, annexed by Israel after 1967, are issued Israeli identity cards.
2004-04-09 00:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive