Report: Hundreds Of Syrian Soldiers Defect

Britain's military says the soldier brutally murdered in a suspected terrorist attack was a popular drummer and machine gunner, a father, and a passionate fan of Manchester United. The Ministry of Defense identified him Thursday as 25-year-old Lee Rigby, of 2nd Battalion The Royal Regiment of Fusiliers. It says he joined the army in 2006, and was posted in Cyprus, Afghanistan and Germany before becoming a recruiter, assisting with duties in the Tower of London. Capt. Alan Williamson, the adjutant of the 2nd Fusiliers, calls Rigby "a cheeky and humorous man, always there with a joke to brighten the mood." He says the loss of Rigby "will be felt across the battalion, but this is nothing compared to how his family must be feeling." Rigby had a 2-year-old son, Jack.

An Israeli committee has handed the government its proposal for ending a system granting Jewish ultra-Orthodox seminary students automatic exemptions from military service. These exemptions have generated widespread resentment in a country where military service is compulsory for Jewish citizens. Public anger over the exemptions was a central issue in January elections and helped propel the centrist Yesh Atid party to a strong showing. The party promised to end the preferential treatment given to the seminary students. But the committee's proposal, led by Yesh Atid Cabinet Minister Yaakov Peri, is full of compromises. It says religious students do not have to begin serving until age 21, instead of 18, and the new system won't go into effect for three years. The Cabinet is to discuss the proposal on Sunday.

Officials in the Turks and Caicos Islands have recovered $19.5 million and more than 2,500 acres (1,000 hectares) of real estate as they continue to seize assets improperly obtained by corrupt politicians. Thursday's announcement comes six months after the territory began resumed self-government after three years of direct rule imposed by Britain due to a corruption scandal that led to the arrest of the island's jet-setting ex-premier in Brazil. The assets seized include prime seafront property and land in Salt Cay that was projected to be the site of a high-end resort built by a developer who allegedly obtained special immigration status in exchange for a $1.6 million loan. The amount of cash and property seized is expected to increase as courts rule on additional cases involving millions of dollars and more than 1,000 acres (400 hectares) of land identified as ill-gotten assets by the Edwards Wildman law firm contracted to help recover the property. The firm's deputy managing partner, Laurence Harris, said most of the 62 civil cases currently open should be resolved by late summer, with four trials scheduled to start before the end of July. He said the property may help the government work with developers to create projects that generate long-term revenues in the territory, a popular tourist destination and financial haven that lies southeast of Miami. A British-appointed commission reported in 2009 that it had found evidence of systematic corruption when it looked into allegations that local politicians were taking payoffs from developers and creating a "climate of fear" in the tiny British territory of about 47,000 people. Some of the land was sold at low prices or given to politicians, said Turks and Caicos Islands governor's spokesman Neil Smith. "There was a whole number of dodgy things that needed to be investigated," he said. The premier at the time, Michael Misick, resigned after the commission released its report. Misick later vanished, only to be arrested Dec. 7 in Rio de Janeiro, where he awaits extradition. Authorities also are seeking to interview Miami developer Cem Kinay in the case, but have not located him. The Turks and Caicos has struggled to recover financially after the corruption scandal and lavish spending by several politicians. In 2011, the territory received a $417 million bailout from the U.K. and its $70 million budget deficit has since been whittled down. The government also is awaiting the start of criminal trials in the corruption case. Thirteen people have been charged with corruption, including five former Cabinet ministers, four of them from Misick's administration. Two of the 13 have settled their cases after paying large fines, while the others await trial. The judicial process has been delayed because the suspects are seeking legal aid, Smith said. "They want more public money to help defend themselves, which is ironic given the charges," he said.

The United States and Israel raised hopes Thursday for a restart of the Middle East peace process, despite little tangible progress so far from U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry's two-month-old effort to get Israelis and Palestinians back to the negotiating table. As they met in Jerusalem, Kerry praised Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for the "seriousness" with which he is looking at ways to revitalize peace hopes. Kerry expressed optimism without outlining any concrete strategy for ending a stalemate between the two sides that has seen them hardly negotiate one-on-one at all over the last 4 1/2 years. "I know this region well enough to know there is skepticism, in some quarters there is cynicism and there are reasons for it," Kerry told reporters. "There have been bitter years of disappointment. It is our hope that by being methodical, careful, patient -- but detailed and tenacious -- that we can lay on a path ahead that can conceivably surprise people and certainly exhaust  the possibilities of peace." "That's what we're working towards," said Kerry, who met with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas later Thursday in Ramallah. Netanyahu said his conversation with the top American diplomat would touch on mutual concerns about Iran and Syria. "But above all," he said, "what we want to do is restart the peace talks with the Palestinians." "It's something I want, it's something you want," Netanyahu told Kerry. "It's something I hope the Palestinians want as well and we ought to be successful for a simple reason: When there's a will, we'll find a way." The visit, Kerry's fourth trip to the Jewish state since taking office as secretary of state in February, coincides with deepening pessimism from Palestinian officials about the new peace push. They are planning to resume their campaign of seeking membership in key international organizations as early as next month in a bid to put pressure on Israel into offering some concessions. Without major U.S. pressure on Israel, the outlook seems bleak. The most immediate divide concerns the issue of Israeli settlement building in the West Bank and east Jerusalem -- lands that Israel conquered in the 1967 Mideast war and which the Palestinians hope to include in their state. Kerry brought "nothing new" to his discussions with Abbas, lamented one Palestinian official familiar with the talks. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorized to speak publicly on the private meetings, said Palestinian expectations remain low because they see Kerry "trying to accommodate the Israelis, not pressure the Israelis." While Palestinians have praised Kerry's efforts, they say there has been little progress ahead of what they believe to be a June 7 deadline for action. They are already beginning work on a "day-after" strategy. And they say there is no point in negotiating while Israel continues to build Jewish settlements. More than 500,000 Israelis now live in the West Bank and east Jerusalem, making it increasingly difficult to partition the land between Israel and the Palestinians. Israel also captured the Gaza Strip in 1967, though it withdrew from the territory in 2005. The Palestinians have demanded that Israel freeze settlement construction and accept the pre-1967 frontiers as the baselines of a future border. While previous Israeli leaders have used the 1967 lines as a starting point for talks, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin says negotiations should begin without any preconditions. When President Barack Obama took office in 2009, he took a tough line against the settlements and prodded Israel into a partial construction freeze. But Israel refused to extend the freeze, and a short-lived round of negotiations in 2010 quickly collapsed. Obama similarly tried unsuccessfully to press Israel into accepting the 1967 lines as a baseline for talks. Fed up with the impasse and disillusioned with Obama, the Palestinians last fall won recognition from the U.N. General Assembly as a nonmember state, an upgraded diplomatic status that gives them access to key U.N. bodies. The U.S. was one of just eight countries that sided with Israel in opposing the bid. Israel fears the Palestinians will now seek membership in international agencies to promote an anti-Israel agenda. Its biggest concern is that the Palestinians will try to join the International Criminal Court and try to press war crimes charges against Israel. Israel's chief peace negotiator, Tzipi Livni, said Thursday that Israel must push forward with peace efforts, in a message directed mainly to hardliners in her own country. "The Palestinian issue isn't something that will disappear and it is not an issue where someone can say, `There are more worrying things, so let's not deal with it,"' she told Israel Radio. "I still think that the freeze of the past four years is bad," she said, speaking in Hebrew. "As time elapses, the ability to ignite the negotiations gets more problematic. The price that Israel pays both in the short and long-term are higher. And therefore the freeze does not serve those that want to reach an agreement." Livni said the Israeli-Palestinian standoff only serves those who believe in mantras like "here we are holding on to the land, here we built another house, here we prevented an agreement." "This isn't me and I don't believe it represents the mainstream or the basic position of the Israeli public," she said. "And I believe I represent the Israeli national and security interests in the long-term." Kerry's plan remains opaque, even to officials in the Obama administration. One element will clearly focus on improving the Palestinian economy by spurring private investment. He also recently persuaded the 22-member Arab League to renew a decade-old peace offer to Israel, with new incentives aimed at making it more attractive to Israel. But he has yet to wrest any clear overture from the Israelis. Meeting Israeli President Shimon Peres on Thursday evening, Kerry said the moment was critical "for the region, and particularly for Israel and for Palestine." "There is an opportunity, but for many reasons it's not on the tip of everybody's tongue," he said. "The people in Israel aren't waking up every day and wondering if tomorrow (there will) be peace because there is a sense of security, and a sense of accomplishment and a sense of prosperity. "But I think if you look over the horizon," he added, "one can see the challenges. And I think that the importance of trying to resolve this in this moment, where there is willingness for people to look for a way, can't be overstated."

The head of Pakistan's military has told the country's incoming prime minister that there is no secret agreement with the United States on the use of drones, FoxNews.com has learned. Sources tell Fox News that Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani says he will back Pakistan's new leader in an election pledge to counter the U.S. drone campaign, which has stoked anti-American sentiment among voters, and has become more of an issue with both the Pakistani military and the previous administration. A change in the drone program would mark a distinct shift in U.S.-Pakistani relations. The previous Pakistani government,democratically elected in 2008, tacitly allowed the CIA to continue conducting unmanned aerial vehicle attacks on militants on Pakistani soil. Nawaz Sharif, the twice-elected former prime minister who will once again lead a new government, has promised to change Pakistan's foreign and national security policies when he takes office. He has said he will immediately raise the drone issue with the U.S., and wants to end strikes targeting militants in the country's tribal belt, an area beyond Pakistani government control. Gen. Kayani has agreed to back Sharif on countering America's drone campaign, according to sources. Supporters of the U.S. drone strikes say the program has been instrumental in eliminating a large number of high-value targets in Al Qaeda and other extremist groups. According to the North America Foundation database, 355 drone strikes in Pakistan have killed as many as 3,314 people since 2004. Critics of the drone program, however, charge the attacks have had little actual effect on reducing the number of extremists. Pakistan still harbors and supports America's most wanted. Mullah Omar, spiritual leader of the Afghan Taliban, is believed to hiding in Pakistan, while Hafiz Muhammad Saeed, leader of the terror ring suspected of orchestrating the Mumbai attacks in 2008, roams freely. Al Qaeda's new chief, Ayman Al-Zawahiri, may also be hiding in the rugged, mountainous border between the Pakistan-Afghanistan. "I think the diplomatic rhetoric of just condemning the strike, logging a complaint to the [US] ambassador, and leaving the issue until the next [drone attack] isn't the way we'll handle this,"a senior member of PML-N said, speaking on the condition of anonymity, as he wasn't authorized to talk to media before the formation of the government strategy. "We need to be given a chance to bring the tribal region under [the] constitutional umbrella." Sharif has also said he is willing to talk to the Taliban in an effort to end the violence in the region. "Many lives have been lost and the economy is in dire straits – if Taliban want to have dialogue, we should seriously consider," he said in a pre-parliamentary speech on Monday. "Why can't we talk to the Taliban to make our country peaceful." Many observers have questioned why Sharif's PML-N and Imran Khan, the legendary cricketer turned politician who heads the PTI political party, were spared by the onslaught of attacks by the Taliban in the run-up to elections, while other secular and religious parties were targeted.