Italian activist murdered by extremists

Vittorio Arrigoni, 36, was killed on Thursday by the Tawheed and Jihad group, one of several extremist Islamist groups in the Gaza Strip. About 2,000 people attended a rally to honour him yesterday. His abduction is thought to have been an attempt to force Hamas to release the group's leader, Sheikh Abu Walid-al-Maqdas, a Jordanian Palestinian who was arrested last month. guardian