Gen. Abdelfatah Yunis, commander of Libya's rebel forces, said April 7 that NATO apologized for mistakenly hitting a column of rebel tanks near the eastern town of Ajdabiya. Yunis said the deadly air-strike occurred despite a warning to NATO that the tanks were being moved to the front line. By conflicting reports, the air-strike killed between four and 134 rebel fighters. NATO says it is investigating the incident. "We would like to receive answers about what happened. We would like a rational and convincing explanation," Gen. Yunis said. (BBC News, April 7) High-level US diplomatic figures from the US, UK and France are meanwhile said to have met with leading members of the Transitional National Council (TNC) to discuss (ostensibly "humanitarian") aid to the rebels. Only France, Italy and Qatar have thus far officially recognized the rebels as the legitimate government of Libya. (AFP, April 7)

Israeli artillery fire killed five Palestinians and injured some 40 after an anti-tank missile from the Gaza Strip hit a school bus in southern Israel, injuring two people, April 8. One of the dead is reported to be a small child. Hamas's armed wing claimed responsibility for the missile attack, saying it was an "initial response" to Israel killing three of the group's leaders last weekend, when an air-strike hit their car in southern Gaza. But the escalation comes one day after the Hamas administration in Gaza said it had got most armed Palestinian factions in Gaza to sign on to a ceasefire in a bid to prevent further Israeli strikes. (Ma'an News Agency, April 8)

A magnitude 7.4 aftershock hit northeastern Japan April 7—raising fears of a deepening of the crisis at the stricken Fukushima nuclear plant. Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) reported no serious incidents as a result of the aftershock. But Ed Lyman, a nuclear safety expert at the Union of Concerned Scientists told the LA Times' Ecocentric blog: "The damage that has been done to date by the earthquake and tsunami has degraded the plant's ability to withstand ground motion, so you have more chance of a containment breach with the next earthquake. The conditions at the plant are so fragile, it can't really stand many more challenges."

From Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER), April 5:

Washington, DC — A plan awaiting approval by the US Environmental Protection Agency that would dramatically increase permissible radioactive releases in drinking water, food and soil after "radiological incidents" is drawing vigorous objections from agency experts, according to agency documents released today by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER). At issue is the acceptable level of public health risk following a radiation release, whether an accidental spill or a "dirty bomb" attack.

From the PBS Frontline website, a translation by Frieda Afary of a March 29 statement from the Iranian site Akhbar Rooz:

Call for Active Opposition to the Nuclear Policy of the Islamic Republic of Iran
Fukushima completed the warning that was issued by Chernobyl. After Chernobyl, any trust in the ability of technology and the technicians to control the radioactive giant was lost. Fukushima further destroyed any trust in the ability to forecast earthquakes and other factors that turn nuclear power stations into ticking time bombs.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on April 3 called on the UN to retract the Goldstone Report following statements made by Richard Goldstone in a Washington Post op-ed. Netanyahu said the Goldstone Report, which found that Israel committed war crimes in Operation Cast Lead after a fact finding mission, is called into question by Goldstone's April 1 article, where he wrote: "If I had known then what I know now, the Goldstone Report would have been a different document." According to Goldstone, new evidence has shown that Israel never targeted civilians in the conflict as originally alleged.

US Attorney General Eric Holder announced April 4 that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four other co-conspirators will be tried before a military commission for their roles in the 9-11 terrorist attacks. Holder, who wanted the accused be tried before a federal civilian court, referred the cases to the Department of Defense after Congress imposed a series of restrictions barring the transfer of Guantánamo Bay detainees to the US. Holder said he refused to delay the trial any longer for the sake of the victims of the 9-11 attacks and their families, explaining that the restrictions are not likely to be repealed in the immediate future. While deciding to proceed with military commissions, Holder defended the federal judiciary, saying:

The Independent reports April 3 eye-witness accounts that "Military and diplomatic operatives from the US and Western Europe—usually described as experts, consultants and advisers—turned up in the rebel capital, Benghazi. These include UK personnel, among them a former Royal Navy officer who had recently served as a diplomat in Afghanistan. He said he was in Libya as a consultant to the opposition administration." The word comes as Reuters reports that Tripoli has dispatched deputy foreign minister Abdelati Obeidi to Athens in a diplomatic initiative to end the conflict.