2 Americans among dead in Jordan

AMMAN, Jordan -

A Jordanian police captain opened fire yesterday on instructors at an international police training center in Jordan's capital, killing at least five people, including two Americans, before being shot dead by security forces.

It was not clear if there was a political motive to the shooting spree, which also wounded six people, including two Americans. But concern has swirled in staunchly pro-Western Jordan over possible revenge attacks by Islamic militants since the country assumed a high-level role in the U.S.-led military campaign against the Islamic State extremist group, which controls large areas of neighboring Syria and Iraq.

The unprecedented assault inside a Jordanian security compound also raised questions about the kingdom's image as an island of relative stability in a turbulent region.

The shooting took place at the Jordan International Police Training Center in Amman, where Jordanian and foreign instructors, including Americans, have trained thousands of police officers from the Palestinian territories and other parts of the Arab world in recent years.

The Jordanian officer opened fire, killing the two Americans and a South African contractor before being shot dead, government spokesman Mohammed Momani said. Two Jordanians were critically wounded and later died, he said.

Momani did not release the assailant's name, but a former Jordanian parliament member, Suleiman Saed, identified him as his 29-year-old relative, Anwar Abu Zaid, a captain in the police force. He said the assailant's identity was given to him by a senior official in the Public Security Department.

JERUSALEM -

Israel is still lacking evidence to charge those responsible for a deadly arson attack on a Palestinian family this summer, Israeli media reported the country's defense minister as saying yesterday, in a case that Palestinians say helped fuel the past weeks of bloodshed.

In July, assailants, believed to be Jewish extremists, lobbed a firebomb into the Dawabsheh family's home in the West Bank village of Duma, where four family members were asleep. Ali Dawabsheh, a toddler, was burned to death, while his mother and father later died of their wounds. His 4-year-old brother Ahmad is being treated in an Israeli hospital.

Defense Minister Moshe Yaalon said a "group of Jewish fanatics" who want to install a "religious kingdom" based on biblical law were behind the attack. Yaalon's remarks to military correspondents were reported by Israel's Walla news site.

But Yaalon said, "We don't currently have evidence that directly ties the one who carried out the terror attack but I believe we will get that, I hope that we will solve the case completely," Yaalon said.

Israeli leaders across the political spectrum have strongly condemned the firebomb attack and vowed to apprehend the assailants. But the fact that no one has been officially charged months after the attack is a sore point among Palestinians and many cite the case as a big factor in fueling the current violence.

Since mid-September, 12 Israelis have been killed in Palestinian attacks, mostly stabbing assaults. Meanwhile, 75 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire, including 48 said by Israel to have been involved in attacks or attempted attacks. The other Palestinians died in clashes between stone-throwers and security forces.

YANGON, Myanmar -

Myanmar's military-backed ruling party today was headed for a massive rout at the hands of opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi, who was set for a historic electoral victory that could give her party the presidency and loosen the military's grip on the country.

With official results from Sunday's general elections slow to come, Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy started announcing its victories late yesterday - by midnight it had declared it had won virtually every seat in four of 14 states where counting was complete. The announcement at the NLD headquarters set off a new round of jubilation among the party's red-shirted supporters, who already had been celebrating the result of Sunday's vote.

Even without official results, it was clear that the Union Solidarity Development Party was facing a rout. The party is made up former junta members who ruled the Southeast Asian country for a half-century and as a quasi-civilian government since 2011.

LONDON -

The old adage says an Englishman's home is his castle. But a court says Robert Fidler's castle can't be his home.

A judge ruled yesterday that the 66-year-old farmer will go to prison if he doesn't demolish a mock-Tudor castle he built without planning permission.

Fidler built the four-bedroom structure - complete with two turrets - on his farm about 20 miles south of London in 2000, keeping it hidden behind piles of straw bales and tarpaulin.

Local authorities ordered him to tear it down in 2007, saying it breached planning rules designed to protect the countryside, and Fidler lost several legal challenges against the order.

- Associated Press