Palestinian dies after Israeli troops fire at Gaza border: medics

GAZA (Reuters) - One of six Palestinians shot and wounded by Israeli troops on Friday while protesting at the Gaza Strip boundary fence died on Saturday, hospital officials said.

The fortified fence and a 300-metre-deep zone on the Palestinian side - on which Israel has regularly fired since 2009 with the declared aim of keeping gunmen and infiltrators away from the border - have been a testing ground for the November 21 truce that ended an eight-day surge in Gaza fighting.

Gaza's Hamas government has said the Egyptian-brokered ceasefire would put an end to the Israeli no-go zone, allowing Palestinian farmers back to their land there. Israel has said it would back off if Palestinians did not threaten to strike across the boundary.

Asked about Friday's shootings near the southern town of Rafah, an Israeli military spokeswoman said Palestinians had come up to the fence to vandalize it. Soldiers warned them away, and when that did not deter them, shot at their legs, she said.

Palestinians described the incident as a demonstration, saying that six people were wounded by the Israeli gunfire. One of them, a 21-year-old man, died on Saturday, hospital officials in Gaza said.

Islamist Hamas remains hostile to the Jewish state but has on at least one occasion sent police to evacuate such protests since the ceasefire, saying it sought both to shore up the truce and prevent Palestinian casualties.

(Writing by Dan Williams and Nidal al-Mughrabi; Editing by Pravin Char)

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North Korea plans second rocket launch in December

SEOUL (Reuters) - North Korea is to carry out its second rocket launch this year in December as South Korea holds its presidential election in a move that will likely trigger diplomatic tensions between the two Koreas and censure from the United States and Japan.

State news agency KCNA said on Saturday that the launch of a rocket carrying a satellite would take place between December 10 and December 22.

North Korea says its launches are for peaceful purposes, although Washington and Seoul believe the isolated, impoverished state is testing long-range missile technology with the aim of developing an intercontinental ballistic missile capable of carrying a nuclear warhead.

North Korea undertook a similar launch in April that was aborted a few minutes into its mission. The North is banned from conducting missile or nuclear-related activities under United Nations resolutions.

The coming launch will take place around the time of South Korea's presidential polls on December 19 and close to the first anniversary of the death of former leader Kim Jong-il.

Kim died on December 17 last year and was succeeded by his son, Kim Jong-un.

(Reporting by David Chance and John Ruwitch; Editing by Ron Popeski)

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Islamists rally behind Mursi as Egypt's rifts widen

CAIRO (Reuters) - Islamist crowds demonstrated in Cairo on Saturday in support of President Mohamed Mursi, who is racing through a constitution to try to defuse opposition fury over his newly expanded powers.

Many thousands assembled outside Cairo University, waving Egyptian flags and green Islamist emblems to show their backing for the president and the constitution he is promoting.

Mursi was expected later in the day to set a date for a referendum on the constitution hastily approved by an Islamist-dominated drafting assembly on Friday after a 19-hour session.

Mohamed Ibrahim, a hardline Salafi Islamist scholar and a member of the constituent assembly, said secular-minded Egyptians had been in a losing battle from the start.

"They will be sure of complete popular defeat today in a mass Egyptian protest that says 'no to the conspiratorial minority, no to destructive directions and yes for stability and sharia (Islamic law)'," he told Reuters.

Demonstrators, many of them bused in from the countryside, held pro-constitution banners. Some read "Islam is coming", "Yes to stability" and "No to corruption".

Tens of thousands of Egyptians had protested against Mursi on Friday and rival demonstrators threw stones after dark in Alexandria and the Nile Delta town of Al-Mahalla Al-Kobra.

"The people want to bring down the regime," they chanted in Cairo's Tahrir Square, echoing the slogan that rang out there less than two years ago and brought down Hosni Mubarak.

Mursi plunged Egypt into a new crisis last week when he gave himself extensive powers and put his decisions beyond judicial challenge, saying this was a temporary measure to speed Egypt's democratic transition until the new constitution is in place.

His assertion of authority in a decree issued on November 22, a day after he won world praise for brokering a Gaza truce between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist Hamas movement, dismayed his opponents and widened divisions among Egypt's 83 million people.

Two people have been killed and hundreds wounded in protests by disparate opposition forces drawn together and re-energized by a decree they see as a dictatorial power grab.

Mursi has alienated many of the judges who must supervise the referendum. His decree nullified the ability of the courts, many of them staffed by Mubarak-era appointees, to strike down his measures, although says he respects judicial independence.

A source at the presidency said Mursi might rely on the minority of judges who support him to supervise the referendum.

Mursi, once a senior Muslim Brotherhood figure, has put his liberal, leftist, Christian and other opponents in a bind. If they boycott the referendum, the constitution would pass anyway.

If they secured a "no" vote to defeat the draft, the president could retain the powers he has unilaterally assumed.

And Egypt's quest to replace the basic law that underpinned Mubarak's 30 years of army-backed one-man rule would also return to square one, creating more uncertainty in a nation in dire economic straits and seeking a $4.8 billion loan from the IMF.

"NO PLACE FOR DICTATORSHIP"

Mursi's well-organized Muslim Brotherhood and its ultra-orthodox Salafi allies, however, are convinced they can win the referendum by mobilizing their own supporters and the millions of Egyptians weary of political turmoil and disruption.

"There is no place for dictatorship," the president said on Thursday while the constituent assembly was still voting on a constitution which Islamists say enshrines Egypt's new freedoms.

Human rights groups have voiced misgivings, especially about articles related to women's rights and freedom of speech.

The text limits the president to two four-year terms, requires him to secure parliamentary approval for his choice of prime minister, and introduces a degree of civilian oversight over the military - though not enough for critics.

The draft constitution also contains vague, Islamist-flavored language that its opponents say could be used to whittle away human rights and stifle criticism.

For example, it forbids blasphemy and "insults to any person", does not explicitly uphold women's rights and demands respect for "religion, traditions and family values".

The draft injects new Islamic references into Egypt's system of government but retains the previous constitution's reference to "the principles of sharia" as the main source of legislation.

"We fundamentally reject the referendum and constituent assembly because the assembly does not represent all sections of society," said Sayed el-Erian, 43, a protester in Tahrir and member of a party set up by opposition figure Mohamed ElBaradei.

Several independent newspapers said they would not publish on Tuesday in protest. One of the papers also said three private satellite channels would halt broadcasts on Wednesday.

Egypt cannot hold a new parliamentary election until a new constitution is passed. The country has been without an elected legislature since a court ordered the dissolution of the Islamist-dominated lower house in June.

(Additional reporting by Marwa Awad; Editing by Louise Ireland)

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Syrian jets bomb rebels, Internet down for third day

BEIRUT (Reuters) - Syrian jets bombed rebel-held areas of Damascus on Saturday, residents said, and a countrywide Internet blackout entered its third day.

Syrian rebels fighting to oust President Bashar al-Assad clashed with troops in most populated areas of the country, according to opposition activists. At least 40,000 people have been killed during the 20-month-old uprising, they say.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an opposition-linked monitor, said war planes were bombing the Damascus suburbs of Kafar Souseh and Darraya.

If rebels maintain a presence in these areas, they will hold ground in a continuous arc from the northeast to southwest of the capital's outer districts.

"Syrian regular forces are trying to control the areas surrounding the capital and clashed with rebel fighters," the Observatory said.

The mostly Sunni Muslim rebels battling Assad, who is from Syria's Alawite minority linked to Shi'ite Islam, have been making gains across Syria by overrunning military bases and have been ramping up attacks on Damascus, his seat of power.

Since Thursday, clashes have been reported near the Aqraba and Babilla districts on the southeastern outskirts of Damascus which lead to the international airport, effectively closing the road and leading EgyptAir and Emirates to suspend flights.

Syrian state television quoted a ministry of information statement saying the Damascus international airport was open on Saturday and that the road leading to it was safe. Opposition activists said clashes continued.

Networking experts accuse the government of cutting off the Internet but Damascus blames "terrorists," a term it uses for the opposition.

Rights groups have warned the communications drop off is a precursor to a wider offensive by government forces in the capital. Syrian security sources and diplomats say the government intends to block central Damascus from the restive suburbs.

Rebels and activists said on Saturday there have been multiple communications problems since the uprising began.

Abu Yazen, an activist from the central city of Homs, said rebel units had been using satellite phones, radios and Skype to coordinate with each other.

"There is no Internet or phone service in Syria but it has not affected our work too much," he told Reuters over Skype.

Activists reported clashes and aerial strikes in the provinces of Homs, Deir al-Zor, Idlib and in Aleppo where they said 14 rebels fighters were killed during an assault on an army base in the town of Khanasser early on Saturday.

(Reporting by Oliver Holmes; Editing by Janet Lawrence)

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Analysis: The next stop for Palestinians could be global courts

(Reuters) - The U.N. General Assembly's overwhelming vote to recognize Palestine as a non-member state offers little prospect for greater clout in world politics but it could make a difference in the international courts.

The formal recognition of statehood, even without full U.N. membership, could be enough for the Palestinians to achieve membership at the Hague-based International Criminal Court (ICC), where member states have the power to refer for investigation alleged war crimes or crimes against humanity.

With its upgraded status at the U.N., the Palestinians may now seek to apply to the ICC for membership and authority to file war-crimes charges against the Israeli government and its officials.

That threat of so-called "lawfare" has already prevented some Israeli civilian and military leaders from traveling abroad out of fear they'd be arrested as war criminals.

"Israelis are afraid of being hauled to The Hague," said Robert Malley, the Middle East program director for the International Crisis Group.

The Palestinians have long planned to use non-membership statehood at the U.N., once obtained, as a way to enter the ICC. One Palestinian negotiator, in talking to the International Crisis Group, called the strategy a "legal or diplomatic intifada" against Israel.

When Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas addressed the United Nations in September he specifically accused Israel of committing war crimes.

Israeli officials have said the country's armed forces strictly adhere to international law and argue the true aim of Palestinians' accusations is to isolate Israel.

Last spring, the ICC's former chief prosecutor turned down a 2009 Palestinian request for prosecution of Israel's actions in the 2008-2009 Gaza war with Hamas, specifically noting that Palestine was only a U.N. observer entity.

In September, the new ICC prosecutor, Fatou Bensouda, said a General Assembly vote could make the difference.

"What we have also done is to leave the door open and to say that if this -- if Palestine is able to pass over that (statehood) hurdle, of course, under the General Assembly, then we will revisit what the ICC can do," Bensouda said during a talk in New York.

The Hague-based ICC is the one international venue where individuals can be criminally charged. All 117 countries that ratified the Rome Statute, which created the court, are bound to turn over suspects.

The United States and Israel have not joined the Rome Statute, but that would not prevent the Palestinians from pursing cases under the treaty. ICC arrest warrants and rulings carry geopolitical weight even when they can't be enforced. An indictment of Libya's Moammar Gadhafi last year helped mobilize international support for the rebels who opposed him.

Of course, if the Palestinians enter the legal battlefield, they, too, risk being accused and prosecuted in the venues where they'd try to target Israelis.

There is no guarantee for either side that the ICC prosecutor would follow through on charges. The ICC has procedural obstacles that could head off any prosecution there.

Some commentators argue that, like lawyers in any legal fight, both the Palestinians and Israelis have exaggerated the stakes in what's more of a political and public-relations drama.

"The concern that something dramatic would change is overblown," said Rosa Brooks, a professor of international law at Georgetown University who has also served in policy roles at the State and Defense departments.

And it's important to remember that the ICC is a political organization as much as a legal one -- cases are initiated by member governments and the U.N. Security Council -- so geopolitical considerations can trump a strictly legal case.

(Reporting by Joseph Schuman; Editing by Eileen Daspin and Lisa Shumaker)

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Palestinians win de facto U.N. recognition of sovereign state

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - The 193-nation U.N. General Assembly on Thursday overwhelmingly approved the de facto recognition of the sovereign state of Palestine after Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas called on the world body to issue its long overdue "birth certificate."

The U.N. victory for the Palestinians was a diplomatic setback for the United States and Israel, which were joined by only a handful of countries in voting against the move to upgrade the Palestinian Authority's observer status at the United Nations to "non-member state" from "entity," like the Vatican.

Britain called on the United States to use its influence to help break the long impasse in Israeli-Palestinian peace talks. Washington also called for a revival of direct negotiations.

There were 138 votes in favor, nine against and 41 abstentions. Three countries did not take part in the vote, held on the 65th anniversary of the adoption of U.N. resolution 181 that partitioned Palestine into separate Jewish and Arab states.

Thousands of flag-waving Palestinians in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip set off fireworks and danced in the streets to celebrate the vote.

The assembly approved the upgrade despite threats by the United States and Israel to punish the Palestinians by withholding funds for the West Bank government. U.N. envoys said Israel might not retaliate harshly against the Palestinians over the vote as long as they do not seek to join the International Criminal Court.

If the Palestinians were to join the ICC, they could file complaints with the court accusing Israel of war crimes, crimes against humanity and other serious crimes.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called the vote "unfortunate and counterproductive," while the Vatican praised the move and called for an internationally guaranteed special status for Jerusalem, something bound to irritate Israel.

The much-anticipated vote came after Abbas denounced Israel from the U.N. podium for its "aggressive policies and the perpetration of war crimes," remarks that elicited a furious response from the Jewish state.

"Sixty-five years ago on this day, the United Nations General Assembly adopted resolution 181, which partitioned the land of historic Palestine into two states and became the birth certificate for Israel," Abbas told the assembly after receiving a standing ovation.

"The General Assembly is called upon today to issue a birth certificate of the reality of the State of Palestine," he said.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu responded quickly, condemning Abbas' critique of Israel as "hostile and poisonous," and full of "false propaganda.

"These are not the words of a man who wants peace," Netanyahu said in a statement released by his office. He reiterated Israeli calls for direct talks with the Palestinians, dismissing Thursday's resolution as "meaningless."

ICC THREAT

A number of Western delegations noted that Thursday's vote should not be interpreted as formal legal recognition of a Palestinian state. Formal recognition of statehood is something that is done bilaterally, not by the United Nations.

Granting Palestinians the title of "non-member observer state" falls short of full U.N. membership - something the Palestinians failed to achieve last year. But it does have important legal implications - it would allow them access to the ICC and other international bodies, should they choose to join.

Abbas did not mention the ICC in his speech. But Palestinian Foreign Minister Riyad al-Maliki told reporters after the vote that if Israel continued to build illegal settlements, the Palestinians might pursue the ICC route.

"As long as the Israelis are not committing atrocities, are not building settlements, are not violating international law, then we don't see any reason to go anywhere," he said.

"If the Israelis continue with such policy - aggression, settlements, assassinations, attacks, confiscations, building walls - violating international law, then we have no other remedy but really to knock those to other places," Maliki said.

In Washington, a group of four Republican and Democratic senators announced legislation that would close the Palestinian office in Washington unless the Palestinians enter "meaningful negotiations" with Israel, and eliminate all U.S. assistance to the Palestinian Authority if it turns to the ICC.

"I fear the Palestinian Authority will now be able to use the United Nations as a political club against Israel," said Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, one of the sponsors.

Abbas led the campaign to win support for the resolution, which followed an eight-day conflict this month between Israel and Islamists in the Gaza Strip, who are pledged to Israel's destruction and oppose a negotiated peace.

The vote highlighted how deeply divided Europe is on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

At least 17 European nations voted in favor of the Palestinian resolution, including Austria, France, Italy, Norway and Spain. Abbas had focused his lobbying efforts on Europe, which supplies much of the aid the Palestinian Authority relies on. Britain, Germany and many others chose to abstain.

The traditionally pro-Israel Czech Republic was unique in Europe, joining the United States, Israel, Canada, Panama and the tiny Pacific Island states Nauru, Palau, Marshall Islands and Micronesia in voting against the move.

'HOPE SOME REASON WILL PREVAIL'

Peace talks have been stalled for two years, mainly over Israeli settlements in the West Bank, which have expanded despite being deemed illegal by most of the world. There are 4.3 million Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.

After the vote, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice called for the immediate resumption of peace talks.

"The Palestinian people will wake up tomorrow and find that little about their lives has changed save that the prospects of a durable peace have only receded," she said.

She added that both parties should "avoid any further provocative actions in the region, in New York or elsewhere."

Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad said he hoped all sides would use the vote to push for new breakthroughs in the peace process.

"I hope there will be no punitive measures," Fayyad told Reuters in Washington, where he was attending a conference.

"I hope that some reason will prevail and the opportunity will be taken to take advantage of what happened today in favor of getting a political process moving," he said.

Britain's U.N. ambassador, Mark Lyall Grant, told reporters it was time for recently re-elected U.S. President Barack Obama to make a new push for peace.

"We believe the window for the two-state solution is closing," he said. "That is why we are encouraging the United States and other key international actors to grasp this opportunity and use the next 12 months as a way to really break through this impasse."

(Additional reporting by Andrew Quinn in Washington, Noah Browning in Ramallah, Jeffrey Heller in Jerusalem, Robert Mueller in Prague, Gabriela Baczynska and Reuters bureaux in Europe and elsewhere; Editing by Eric Beech and Peter Cooney)

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Fighting cuts access to Damascus airport, flights suspended

BEIRUT (Reuters) - Syrian rebels battled forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad just outside Damascus on Thursday, cutting access to its international airport, and Dubai-based Emirates airline and EgyptAir stopped flights to the Syrian capital.

The Internet and some telephone lines went down across Syria. Rebels and the government traded blame for the blackout, the worst communications outage in 20 months of conflict.

Rebels fighting to topple Assad have been making gains around Syria by overrunning military bases and have been ramping up attacks on Damascus, his seat of power.

A rebel fighter who identified himself as Abu Omar, a member of the Jund Allah brigade, told Reuters that insurgents fired mortars at the airport's runways and were blocking the road linking it with the capital.

Speaking from the scene of the fighting, he said insurgents were not inside the airport but were able to block access to and from it.

A spokesman for a rebel Military Council in Damascus, Musaab Abu Qitada, said an artillery round was fired at a military site inside the airport and that fighting was now less than a kilometer (mile) away from the complex.

"We want to liberate the airport because of reports we see and our own information we have that shows civilian airplanes are being flown in here with weapons for the regime. It is our right to stop this," he told Reuters on Skype from Damascus.

U.S. and European officials said rebels were making gains in Syria, gradually eroding Assad's power, but said the fighting had not yet shifted decisively in their favor.

Two Austrian soldiers in a U.N. peacekeeping force deployed to monitor the frontier with the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights were wounded when their convoy came under fire near Damascus airport, Austria's defense ministry said. Syria state television said the soldiers were wounded by gunfire when rebels attacked an army position near the airport road.

The Information Ministry later said the highway to the airport was safe after security forces cleared it of "terrorists." Rebels said fighting in the area was continuing. The ministry said the airport was operating regularly, but there were no flights scheduled to land in the evening.

The accounts of fighting could not be verified immediately because of tight restrictions on media access to Syria.

But many airlines had already halted flights. Emirates suspended daily service to Damascus "until further notice." EgyptAir also said it was suspending all flights to Damascus because of "the deterioration of the security situation" there.

An EgyptAir flight that left at 1:30 p.m. (1130 GMT) landed in Damascus on schedule but the pilot was instructed to take off straight back to Egypt, airport sources in Cairo said.

INTERNET, PHONE LINES DOWN

Residents said the Internet in Damascus crashed in the early afternoon, and mobile and land telephone lines were functioning only intermittently.

A blog post on Renesys, a U.S. company which tracks Internet traffic worldwide, said that at 12:26 pm (1026 GMT), the entire country's Internet connectivity shut down completely.

The government has been accused of cutting communications in previous assaults on rebel-held areas in Syria. Syria's minister of information said "terrorists" were responsible for the Internet shutdown, while the telecommunications minister blamed what he said was a fault in the main communications network.

The past two weeks have seen rebels seizing a series of army bases across Syria, exposing Assad's loss of control in northern and eastern regions despite the devastating air power that he has used to bombard opposition strongholds, killing dozens of civilians as well. More than 40,000 people have been killed since the uprising began, according to opposition groups.

Rebels and activists said the fighting along the road to Damascus airport, southeast of the capital, was heavier in that area than at any other time in the conflict.

"PREPARING FOR MAJOR BATTLE"

Nabeel al-Ameer, from the rebel Military Council, said a large number of army reinforcements had arrived along the road after three days of scattered clashes ending with rebels seizing side streets to the north of it.

He said he hoped the proximity of the rebels to the airport would dissuade authorities from using it to import military equipment, but the priority now was to block the road.

There are several military airports around Damascus that remain under government control.

A Syrian security source told Reuters on condition of anonymity that the army had started a "cleansing operation" in the capital to confront rebel advances.

The source, who is from Assad's elite 4th Armoured Division, said one of the aims of the operation was to seal off the suburbs - where rebels are dominant - from the city center.

Assad is fighting an insurgency that grew out of peaceful demonstrations for democratic reform but has escalated, after a military crackdown on protesters, into a bloody civil war.

Syrian warplanes on Thursday bombed Kafr Souseh, Douma and Daraya, neighborhoods that fringe the center of the city where rebels have managed to hide out and ambush army units.

Activists said the areas were taking one of the heaviest poundings they had seen in months.

A senior European Union official said that Assad - whose family has held power in Syria for 42 years - might be preparing for a military showdown around Damascus by isolating the city with a network of checkpoints.

"The rebels are gaining ground but it is still rather slow. We are not witnessing the last days yet," the official said on condition of anonymity.

"On the outskirts of Damascus, there are mortars and more attacks. The regime is thinking of protecting itself ... with checkpoints in the next few days ... (It) seems the regime is preparing for major battle on Damascus."

A U.S. official said the rebels were "making important tactical gains that could eventually trigger a strategic shift in the conflict."

"They haven't reached that point yet, but the span of regime control is narrowing, and Assad's forces are having greater difficulty beating back the insurgents' progress," said the official, who also spoke on condition of anonymity.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton echoed that view in remarks in a speech in Washington.

"I don't know that you can say that for the entire country it is yet at a tipping point, but it certainly seems that the regime will be much harder pressed in the next months," she said.

WARY BIG POWERS

Most foreign powers have condemned Assad but stopped short of arming rebel fighters as they fear heavy weapons could make their way into the hands of radical Islamist units, who have grown increasingly prominent in the insurgency.

Rebels decry their supporters for not providing them with surface-to-air missiles that they say they need to counter the air force. But recent looting of anti-aircraft missiles from army bases, as well as a slow stream of such weapons believed to be coming from Gulf Arab adversaries of Assad, has allowed them to shoot down some helicopters and jets.

U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta told a Pentagon news conference the United States had not provided anti-aircraft missiles to the Syrian opposition, saying it was focused on nonlethal aid and humanitarian relief.

"Let me say unequivocally that we have not provided any of those kinds of missiles to the opposition forces located in Syria," he said.

Panetta and Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak both told the news conference they believed Assad would ultimately fall.

"It's criminal behavior on a global scale what he is doing to his own people, using jet fighters and helicopters and artillery and tanks, killing his own people," Barak said. "The whole world is watching and somehow it's not easy to mobilize enough sense of purpose and unity of action and political will to translate ... our feelings about what happens there into action to stop it."

Peter Bouckeart, emergencies director at Human Rights Watch, said the surface-to-air missiles used so far appeared to have been captured from the Syrian military and there was no evidence any of the ones used to date "have come from outside Syria."

He said the number of these missiles in rebel hands was probably over 20 but could rise significantly if rebels continue to capture military bases.

The relatively small number of anti-aircraft missiles looted so far means that many rebel-controlled areas of the country remain vulnerable to air strikes. The Observatory said 15 citizens, including children and women, were killed during a bombing in Aleppo's Ansari district on Thursday.

(Additional reporting by Dominic Evans and Erika Solomon in Beirut; Yasmine Saleh and Edmund Blair in Cairo, Praveen Menon in Dubai, Tabassum Zakaria and David Alexander in Washington, Tarmo Virki in helsinki and Justyna Pawlak in Brussels; Editing by Tom Pfeiffer and Cynthia Osterman)

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