Occupied Jerusalem: 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 occupied Jerusalem and that they did not suspect a criminal motive.
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 occupied Jerusalem.
“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,” an Israeli police spokesperson said.
No details on the condition of the body or possible clues surrounding the circumstances of the death were revealed.
Police spokesperson Micky Rosenfeld said earlier that Sofer had been hiking with a friend and the pair had been making their way up a hill when they lost contact with each other.
In June, three Israeli seminary students, all teenagers, were kidnapped while hitch-hiking in the occupied West Bank, some 30km south of occupied Jerusalem, and later found dead.
The killings sparked seven weeks of war that ended with an open-ended ceasefire on Tuesday.
Rosenfeld said police — including canine units, mounted officers and helicopters — had combed the entire forest, which spans 310 acres on the outskirts of occupied Jerusalem, 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.
