Tsarnaev’s condition improves; brothers reportedly motivated by U.S. wars

Boston Marathon bombing suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev informed investigators that he and his brother were not directed by a foreign terrorist organization. Instead, they were “self-radicalized” and motivated to kill, in part, by U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Washington Post reported.

The 19-year-old also acknowledged his role in the attack while being questioned by investigators in his hospital bed, the report said. Tsarnaev, who has a gunshot wound to the throat and was sedated, responded in writing. He also suffered gunshot wounds in the head, neck, legs and hand during a late-night shootout in Watertown, Mass.

Meanwhile, Tsarnaev's condition is improving, the FBI said on Tuesday. The college student, who had been listed in serious condition at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center since his capture on Friday, is now in fair condition, the bureau said.

The update comes a day after Tsarnaev was charged with two federal counts of using a weapon of mass destruction to kill, injure and cause widespread damage at the marathon. Tsarnaev was informed of the charges and read his rights in his hospital room on Monday morning, and placed in the custody the U.S. Marshal Service. If convicted, he could face the death penalty.

[Related: ‘#FreeJahar’: Support for Dzhokhar Tsarnaev seen on Twitter]

Three people were killed and more than 200 others wounded when two powerful homemade bombs exploded near the race’s finish line. Dzhokhar and his 26-year-old brother, Tamerlan Tsarnaev, who was killed by police as the two attempted to avoid capture, are suspected of planting those bombs.

Tamerlan was an ardent reader of jihadist websites and extremist propaganda, U.S. officials told the Associated Press, suggesting the brothers were motivated by an anti-American, radical version of Islam.

Meanwhile, U.S. investigators traveled to southern Russia on Tuesday to speak to the parents of the brothers, a U.S. Embassy official told the news service. Zubeidat Tsarnaeva, the mother of the suspects, and their father, Anzor, are in Dagestan, a predominantly Muslim province in Russia's Caucasus.

After the bombings, Anzor said he believed the brothers were set up and called Dzhokhar a "true angel." Maret Tsarnaeva, the brothers' aunt, who lives in Toronto, also said she believes her nephews were framed.

Family members are not the only ones expressing doubt.

Many Twitter users have been expressing support for Dzhokhar using the hashtag #freejahar.

And just like the conspiracy theorists who claimed last week that the Boston Marathon attacks were staged, the support for Dzhokhar has been fervent despite his reported confession.

A Change.org petition to "guarantee Dzhokhar Tsarnaev the right to a fair trial," addressed to President Barack Obama, has more than 6,000 supporters.

NM slaughterhouse ground zero in horse debate

ROSWELL, N.M. (AP) — About five miles from this southeastern New Mexico town's famed UFO museum, tucked between dairy farms, is a nondescript metal building that could be home to any number of small agricultural businesses.

But Valley Meat Co. is no longer just another agricultural business. It's a former cattle slaughterhouse whose kill floor has been redesigned for horses to be led in one at a time, secured in a huge metal chute, shot in the head, then processed into meat for shipment overseas.

It's also ground zero for an emotional, national debate over a return to domestic horse slaughter that has divided horse rescue and animal humane groups, ranchers, politicians and Indian tribes.

At issue is whether horses are livestock or pets, and whether it is more humane to slaughter them domestically than to ship tens of thousands of neglected, unwanted and wild horses thousands of miles to be slaughtered in Mexico or Canada.

Front and center of the debate is Rick De Los Santos, who along with his wife, Sarah, has for more than two decades worked this small slaughterhouse, taking in mostly cows that were too old or sick to travel with larger herds to the bigger slaughterhouses for production.

Now, with cattle herds shrinking amid an ongoing drought, De Los Santos says he and his wife are just trying to transform their business and make enough money to retire by slaughtering domestically some of the thousands of horses that he says travel through the state every month on their way to what are oftentimes less humane and less regulated plants south of the border.

"They are being slaughtered anyway. We thought, well, we will slaughter them here and provide jobs for the economy," De Los Santos said.

Instead, Valley Meat has been ensnarled in a yearlong political drama that has left the plant idle and its owners the target of vandalism and death threats — warnings that increased after humane groups found a video a now-former plant worker posted of himself cursing at animal activists, then shooting one of his own horses to eat.

"People are saying, 'We will slit your throat in your sleep. We hope you die. We hope your kids die,'" De Los Santos said. "Sometimes it's scary. ... And it's all for a horse."

Indeed, voice mails left on the company's answering machine spew hate and wishes for violence upon the family.

"I hope you burn in hell," said one irate woman who called repeatedly, saying, "You better pack your (expletive) bags (expletive) and get out of there because that place is finished."

The couple have hired security and turned over phone records to federal authorities. They are, nevertheless, surprisingly candid about their plans, offering media access to the 7,200-square-foot slaughterhouse with one kill floor and two processing rooms that De Los Santos says can process 50 to 100 horses a day.

"It's complicated, this industry of feeding the world," Sarah De Los Santos says matter-of-factly. The meat would be processed for human consumption and exported to countries in eastern Europe and Asia.

On Tuesday, the U.S. Department of Agriculture is scheduled to inspect the facility to decide whether it can become the first plant in the country to slaughter horses in more than six years.

De Los Santos says he is not worried about passing the inspection. The plant passed one last year but then was told it couldn't begin operations until the USDA developed an acceptable test to measure thehorse meat for drug residue.

It wasn't until the plant sued the USDA for blocking its application that the agency earlier this year agreed to move forward with the inspections necessary to allow Valley Meat Co. and about a half-dozen other plants around the country to slaughter horses.

The Obama administration wants to prohibit such slaughters. The administration's 2014 budget request excludes money for inspectors for horse slaughter plants, which would effectively keep them from operating.

The USDA did not respond to an email from The Associated Press asking about the inspection process and whether a drug test has been developed.

"Everyone is talking about this as a humane issue. This is not a humane issue. It's politics," said De Los Santos.

Humane groups and politicians including Gov. Susana Martinez and New Mexico Attorney General Gary King strongly oppose the plant. They argue that horses are iconic animals in the West, and that other solutions and more funding for horse rescue and birth control programs should be explored over slaughter.

Fueling opposition is a recent uproar in Europe over horse meat being found in products labeled as beef.

Still others are pushing for a return to domestic slaughter. Proponents include several Native American tribes, the American Quarter Horse Association, some livestock associations and even a few horse rescue groups that believe domestic slaughter would be more humane than shipping the animals elsewhere.

They point to a 2011 report from the U.S. Government Accountability Office that found horse abuse and abandonment increasing since Congress effectively banned horse slaughter by cutting funding for federal inspection programs in 2006. Because rescue groups can't take care of all of the horses in need, tens of thousands have been shipped to slaughterhouses in Mexico.

In this mostly agricultural town, whose welcome sign touts it as the Dairy Capital of the Southwest, there is surprisingly little uproar over the plant.

"I was against it," said Larry Connolly, a retiree having coffee at Starbucks last week. "Then I started talking to some ranchers. They said they were for it. So I'm neutral."

Local horse trader and former rancher Dave McIntosh said opening the plant would be "the best thing for the welfare of horses."

But Sheriff Rob Coon said he believes most people in town oppose the plant. His office was inundated with calls and emails from irate people after the horse-killing video was discovered online last month. The former Valley Meat worker posted the video more than a year ago in response to animal activists opposed to horse slaughter.

"A lot the ranchers are for it, simply because they want a place to take a horse rather than starve it out," he said. "But it's not our society. We don't eat horses."

Coon said his department has met with other local agencies in preparation for protests and potential trouble should the plant get the green light to open. But he clearly longs for the day when Roswell — whose main street is populated with statues of green extraterrestrials — was known for a rumored 1947 UFO landing, and little else.

"I was just telling our county manager: What happened to our aliens?" Coon said.

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It's the first time that Israel has accused the embattled Syrian leader of using his stockpile of nonconventional weapons and this assessment, based on visual evidence of alleged attacks, could raise pressure on the U.S. and other Western countries to intervene in the Syrian conflict.

Israeli official: Syria's Assad used chemical arms

By ARIEL DAVID | Associated Press – 17 hrs ago

Associated Press/Jim Watson, Pool - Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, left, welcomes U.S. Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel at his office in Jerusalem, on Tuesday, April 23, 2013. Hagel said the U.S. and Israel need to ensure that their alliance is "closer than ever," as Mideast security challenges grow more complicated. (AP Photo/Jim Watson, Pool)

TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — A senior Israeli military intelligence official said on Tuesday that Syrian President Bashar Assad used chemical weapons last month in his battle against insurgent groups. It was the first time that Israel has accused the embattled Syrian leader of using his stockpile of nonconventional weapons.

Israel's assessment, based on visual evidence of alleged attacks, could raise pressure on the U.S. and other Western countries to intervene in the Syrian conflict. Britain and France recently announced that they had evidence that Assad's government had used chemical weapons. Although the U.S. says it has not been able to verify these claims, President Barack Obama has warned that the introduction of chemical weapons by Assad would be a "game changer."

Brig. Gen. Itai Brun, the head of research and analysis in Israeli military intelligence, told a security conference in Tel Aviv that Assad has used chemical weapons multiple times. Among the incidents were attacks documented by the French and British near Damascus last month. He cited images of people hurt in the alleged attacks, but gave no indication that he had other evidence, such as soil samples, typically used to verify chemical weapons use.

"To the best of our professional understanding, the regime used lethal chemical weapons against the militants in a series of incidents over the past months, including the relatively famous incident of March 19," Brun said. "Shrunken pupils, foaming at the mouth and other signs indicate, in our view, that lethal chemical weapons were used."

He said sarin, a lethal nerve agent, was probably used. He also said the Syrian regime was using less lethal chemical weapons, and that Russia has continued to arm the Syrian military with weapons such as advanced SA-17 air defense missiles.

"The fact that chemical weapons were used without an appropriate response is a very disturbing development because it could signal that such a thing is legitimate," he said. "I think we need to be very worried that chemical weapons will reach elements that are less responsible."

Reacting to Brun's comments, Pentagon spokesman George Little said the U.S. "continues to assess reports of chemical weapons use in Syria."

"The use of such weapons would be entirely unacceptable," he added." ''We reiterate in the strongest possible terms the obligations of the Syrian regime to safeguard its chemical weapons stockpiles, and not to use or transfer such weapons to terrorist groups like Hezbollah."

Russia's Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said such claims had "to be studied carefully." He said previous chemical weapons allegations led to politicized inquiries. Lavrov was speaking through a translator in response to a question asked at a NATO news conference in Brussels. Russia has been weary of foreign intervention in Syria and maintains support for the Assad regime.

Israel, which borders southwestern Syria, has been warily watching the Syrian civil war since the fighting erupted there in March 2011. Although Assad is a bitter enemy, Israel has been careful not to take sides, partly because the Assad family has kept the border with Israel quiet for the past 40 years and partly because of fears of what would happen if he is toppled.

Israeli officials are especially concerned that Assad's stockpile of chemical weapons and other advanced arms could reach the hands of Assad's ally, the Hezbollah militant group in Lebanon, or Islamic extremist groups trying to oust him. The concern is that if Assad is overthrown, any of these groups could turn his sophisticated arsenal against Israel. Hezbollah battled Israel to a monthlong stalemate in 2006.

At a meeting with U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel on Monday, Israel's defense minister, Moshe Yaalon, laid out a number of "clear red lines" to Syria that could trigger an Israeli response. Among them were transferring sophisticated weapons to Hezbollah and other "rogue elements" in Syria, cross-border attacks into Israel or "rogue elements" getting hold of Syrian chemical weapons.

The Israeli military has fired at targets inside Syria on several occasions in response to gunfire or mortar shells landing in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. Israel has all but admitted that it carried out an airstrike in Syria in January that destroyed a shipment of anti-aircraft missiles believed to be headed to Hezbollah.

"We proved it. When they crossed these red lines, we operated, we acted," Yaalon said.

Britain and France informed U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon last month that they have reliable evidence Assad's forces used chemical weapons that caused injuries and deaths. They cited soil samples and interviews with witnesses and opposition figures.

The two countries asked the U.N. chief to investigate allegations of chemical weapons use in two locations near Damascus on March 19, as well as in the city of Homs on Dec. 23. Ban appointed an investigative team, but the Syrian government has largely blocked its effort. Syria, meanwhile, has accused rebels of using chemical weapons.

During a trip to Israel last month, Obama warned that the use of chemical weapons would be a "game changer." He said if confirmed, "the international community has to act on that additional information," but did not detail what the next steps would be.

Amos Yadlin, a retired chief of Israeli military intelligence who heads the Institute for National Security Studies that hosted Tuesday's conference, urged the U.S. to intervene. He said the red line in Syria had been crossed and that the U.S. should act.

Not doing so would "strengthen the opinion of those, particularly in Israel, who are suspicious of America's commitment when red lines are crossed," he said. He suggested the U.S. impose a no-fly zone over Syria or even initiate a bombing campaign similar to the one conducted against the regime of late Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi.

"So far they haven't applied any leverage to Bashar, and this has allowed him to do what Gadhafi could never do," Yadlin told The Associated Press.

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Associated Press writers Peter James Spielmann at the United Nations, Robert Burns in Amman, Jordan, Don Melvin in Brussels, and Kimberly Dozier in Washington contributed.