JERUSALEM -- Rockets struck a residential building in Askhelon on the Israeli side of the Gaza border Monday just hours after Israeli troops pulled out of the area.Several people were treated for shock, but no other injuries were reported, Haaretz reported.Elsewhere on the Israeli-Gaza border Monday, no on was injured when six Qassam rockets hit areas in western Negev -- one landed in Sderot, another in a kibbutz and the rest in open areas, The ... [full story]

JERUSALEM -- Israeli troops Monday pulled out of Gaza, prompting Hamas to declare victory in the recent cross-border fighting in which more than 100 people died.The withdrawal from Hamas-controlled Gaza is a reversal of Sunday's recommendations by Israeli military leaders to keep up pressure, Haaretz reported. Even though ground troops left, a government spokesman said, "We will continue with our defensive actions against those who fire lethal rockets at our civilians."Hamas spokesman Taher a-Nunu told ... [full story]

BALTIMORE -- A restaurant owner says he hopes to start a new Chinatown blocks away from the neighborhood that once served as a center for Baltimore's Chinese immigrants.The present Chinatown hardly exists, The Baltimore Sun reports. Most of the restaurants have closed, and the people who once lived or shopped there have moved on.Sharon Tan and her husband own the Chinatown Cafe, the last restaurant in the area."People come in and ask me directions to ... [full story]

NEW DELHI -- U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Richard Boucher will review the status of the U.S.-India civil nuclear deal on his India visit, a report said Sunday.Boucher's two-day trip to India starting Tuesday comes as India has ended its latest round of talks on a safeguard agreement with the U.N. nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, the Press Trust of India reported.Implementation of the civil nuclear deal, however, remains stalled because of opposition ... [full story]

SACRAMENTO -- The California budget crisis could soon hit the state's public schools as local boards try to put together spending plans for next year."These could be the most devastating cuts our schools have ever seen," Orange County Superintendent William Habermehl told the Orange County Register. "I don't know how some of our school districts will be able to survive this and provide the same quality of education."Seventy percent of California school spending comes from ... [full story]

VIENNA -- New evidence of Iran's nuclear program has led to new efforts by Europe to prevent Iran from becoming a nuclear power, a published report said.Items presented at a meeting in Vienna by the chief U.N. nuclear inspector included a video that appeared to have been made by Iran, The New York Times reported. Representatives to the International Atomic Energy Agency spent two hours looking at the evidence last Monday, the report said.Participants told ... [full story]

LAHORE, Pakistan -- A Pakistan People's Party prime ministerial candidate suggested Sunday his party could work with President Pervez Musharraf, Dawn reported.Chaudhry Ahmed Mukhtar was quoted as telling Dawn, "One must be able to work with everyone, be it a political party or the president."Mukhtar is one of the candidates for the prime minister's post from the PPP, which won the largest number of seats in the parliamentary elections in January. PPP, the party of ... [full story]

PEOTONE, Ill. -- Police in Illinois seized 49 dogs from a dog breeder who allegedly kept them crammed into cages in an unheated shed.The alleged puppy mill was located in Peotone, a rural town about 40 miles south of Chicago, the Chicago Sun-Times reported Sunday. The dogs included Yorkshire terriers, Chihuahuas, Pomeranians and poodles.The South Suburban Humane Society sparked the investigation after a purchaser said a dog from Phoebee's Puppies had been sick. Investigators from ... [full story]

EMORY, Texas - A 16-year-old eastern Texas girl was among four suspects held Sunday in the shooting deaths of her mother and two brothers, police said.The family's father also was wounded in the Saturday attack in rural Rains County, KLTV in Tyler, Texas, reported. Penny Caffey, 37, Matthew Caffey, 13, and Tyler Caffey, 8, were shot and stabbed multiple times in their home, the TV station reported. The father, Terry Caffey, was hospitalized in fair condition ... [full story]

BAGHDAD -  Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad used his historic visit to Iraq Sunday to highlight ties between the two nations.Ahmadinejad's two-day visit to Iraq, the first by an Iranian leader since the eight-year war in the 1980s between Iran and Iraq, began in Baghdad with his Iraqi counterpart, Jalal Talabani. "Our countries have the same viewpoint on the resolution of international and regional problems," Ahmadinejad said at a joint news conference with the Iraqi president, RIA ... [full story]