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Police in Israel find body they believe could be missing American student Police in Israel find body of missing American student
(about 4 hours later)
Israeli police believe there is "a strong possibility" they have found the body of an American seminary student who disappeared while hiking in Jerusalem last week. Israeli police said on Thursday they had found the body of a 23-year-old American student who went missing last week near a forest in Jerusalem and that they did not suspect a criminal motive.
Police said the body was found in the same area where Aharon Sofer went missing. The 23-year-old from Lakewood, New Jersey, had been hiking with a friend in a hilly, forested area on the outskirts of the Israeli capital. Aaron Sofer, a Jewish seminary student from New Jersey, vanished last Friday while walking in woods not far from the Yad Vashem Holocaust museum in Jerusalem. His body was found earlier on Thursday.
"There is a strong possibility that it is the body of the missing student," a spokesman said, stressing that a forensics team was still trying to confirm the identification. "Following a forensic examination, the body ... was identified as that of missing person Aaron Sofer. Tests showed that no criminal act was committed and the body will be transferred to the family in the coming hours," a police spokeswoman said.
The spokesman would not elaborate or say whether there had been any signs of foul play. Police have been conducting an extensive search for Sofer, an ultra-Orthodox student at a yeshiva, or Jewish religious school, named after its founder, Rabbi Tzvi Kaplan. No details on the condition of the body or possible clues surrounding the circumstances of the death were revealed.
Sofer's parents flew to Israel to assist with the search. Police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said earlier that Sofer had been hiking with a friend, making their way up a hill and had lost contact with each other.
In June, three Israeli seminary students, all teenagers, were kidnapped while hitch-hiking in the occupied West Bank, some 30 km (20 miles) south of Jerusalem, and later found dead.
The Palestinian militant group Hamas later acknowledged responsibility for the killings, which helped precipitate seven weeks of war between militants in Gaza and Israel that ended with an open-ended ceasefire on Tuesday.
Rosenfeld said police – including canine units, mounted officers and helicopters had combed the entire Jerusalem forest, which spans 310 acres (125 hectares) at the outskirts of the city, along with volunteers for Sofer.
The Sofer family flew to Israel to be in contact with authorities as the search proceeded. Yoel Sofer said his brother had gone out for a day-long hike during a study break.