Search Underway for American Student Missing in Israel
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iStock/Thinkstock(JERUSALEM) — A large search is underway in the Jerusalem Forest for an American student who never came back from a hike on Friday.
Police units, search and rescue teams and dozens of volunteers are fanning out across the forest to try to find Aaron Sofer, a 23-year-old Orthodox Jew from Lakewood, New Jersey.
Sofer had come to Jerusalem to study in a Yeshiva, or Jewish seminary. He disappeared Friday while hiking with a friend who told Israeli Police the two had split up to take different paths down a steep incline.
Given that the forest is where three Orthodox Israelis burned a Palestinian boy to death last month, police are concerned that Sofer may be the victim of a nationally-motivated crime.
So far, there is no evidence that is the case as the search enters its third day.
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