News in Brief

Leonard Cohen show sells out in hours

All 47,000 tickets to the Leonard Cohen concert in Ramat Gan have been sold in less than 24 hours, the Le'an ticket agency confirmed yesterday. The tickets went on sale on Saturday night, with the high demand causing the ticket agency's Web site to crash within hours. By Sunday noon, tickets reserved for customers of Discount Bank, a key sponsor of the event, also ran out. The tickets were priced at between NIS 450 and NIS 1,200. Cohen's management says profits from the performance will go to Israeli and Palestinian groups working for coexistence. The producers said no additional concerts were planned to accommodate the high demand (Noya Kohavi)

Northern man missing since Wednesday

The police is asking anyone with information on the whereabouts of Yehuda Ben Ami, 53, from moshav Liman near Nahariya, to contact it immediately. Ben Ami was last seen on his way home from his carpentry workshop in the Kiryat Bialik industrial zone at 8 P.M. Wednesday. Ben Ami is 1.80m tall, brown-eyed, with long black-and-gray hair. He was wearing a light T-shirt and jeans, and drove a white Citroen Berlingo van with a roof rack, license plate number 40-869-16. Information can also be delivered to Eyal Ron, 054-8045233 (Michal Popovski).

Former SLA families protest in Tiberias

About 100 veterans of the disbanded South Lebanon Army and their families demonstrated in Tiberias yesterday over what they say was "humiliating treatment" by the state. They particularly protested again a decision to split the responsibilities for their wellbeing, with the Defense Ministry caring for the senior brass of the SLA. The protesters said the Absorption Ministry used to take care of the lower-ranked officers and regular soldiers, but no longer does so. "You cannot treat us like dogs," said one veteran, Fadi Nahara. "We were soldiers, why doesn't the Defense Ministry assume responsibility?" He said many of the veterans are unemployed. (Eli Ashkenazi)