WORLD BRIEFS

IRELAND: Pope to hear bishops on abuse

Irish bishops one by one will give an accounting to Pope Benedict XVI of their views, actions or knowledge about decades of sexual abuse by clergy, a participant said Sunday, but resignations were not on the agenda for the Vatican's extraordinary summit over the scandal. "A casualty of all this has been the truth," Clogher Bishop Joseph Duffy said on the eve of the two-day summit. "The fullness of the truth must come out, everything must be laid on the table." Duffy, a spokesman for the Irish Bishops Conference, said the church was "admittedly slower than in needs to be" in grappling with a "culture of concealment." An investigation last year revealed that church leaders in Dublin had spent decades protecting child-abusing priests from the law while many fellow clerics turned a blind eye. A separate report in Ireland had been released months earlier documenting decades of sexual, physical and psychological abuse in Catholic-run schools, workhouses and orphanages. Several Irish bishops have resigned, but others have flatly refused. Among the 24 bishops at the summit will be Martin Drennan of Galway, who has rebuffed calls that he stepped down. The reports follow a campaign by the archbishop of Dublin and primate of Ireland, Diarmuid Martin, to confront abuse allegations and deal honestly with the cover-up and victims' suffering.

LEBANON: Israeli planes fired upon

Lebanese troops opened fire Sunday on four Israeli warplanes that flew into Lebanese airspace, the army said. Israeli warplanes frequently fly over Lebanese territory in what Israel says are reconnaissance missions. The incident comes amid heightened tensions following some of the sharpest exchanges in years between Israel and its Arab neighbors. Last week, Syria's foreign minister accused Israel of "spreading an atmosphere of war" after Defense Minister Ehud Barak warned that the stalled peace process with Syria could result in an all-out regional war. The Lebanese army said its troops used anti-aircraft fire to force the Israeli warplanes out of airspace in the south and the Bekaa Valley in central Lebanon.

ISRAEL: Harem guru indicted

A man who kept a cultlike harem of women and fathered dozens of children with them was charged in a Tel Aviv court Sunday with enslavement, rape, incest and other offenses. The 25-page indictment accused Goel Ratzon, 60, of setting himself up as a "godlike" figure who preyed on troubled women. Ratzon has denied wrongdoing and said the women joined him voluntarily. The indictment said Ratzon kept at least 21 women who bore him a total of 49 children.