Senate fails to extend jobless aid

Senate fails to extend jobless aid

WASHINGTON

The Senate broke Friday for a two-week recess without approving an extension of jobless benefits after Republicans blocked the $9 billion measure saying it would add to the federal deficit.

Jobless benefits begin running out April 5. Although the extension will be taken up when the Senate returns April 12, nearly 1 million unemployed people could be affected if they are not restored by the end of April, according to the National Employment Law Project. COBRA health insurance subsidies to the unemployed expire Wednesday.

Trial of sergeant to move forward

CAMP PENDLETON, Calif.

A military judge in California denied a motion Friday to dismiss charges against a Marine sergeant whose squad killed 24 Iraqi men, women and children after a bomb killed a Marine.

Lt. Col. David Jones ruled at Camp Pendleton on a defense motion claiming there was unlawful command influence while a general considered a court-martial for Staff Sgt. Frank Wuterich.

Wuterich is the only remaining defendant in the biggest criminal case against U.S. troops to arise from the Iraq war.

He is facing trial on reduced charges of voluntary manslaughter and other crimes in the November 2005 attack in the town of Haditha.

Clashes in Gaza

JERUSALEM

Two Israeli soldiers and a Palestinian civilian were killed Friday as a gunbattle between troops and Palestinian militants widened into some of the fiercest fighting in the Gaza Strip since Israel’s military offensive there last year.

Gaza’s Islamic Hamas rulers confirmed their gunmen were involved in Friday’s violence — marking a shift from the group’s tendency over the past year to avoid confrontation with Israeli forces. Palestinian groups did not confirm the Israeli military’s claim that two militants were killed in the clashes.

Combined dispatches