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Commandos storm Mumbai Jewish center

MUMBAI, Nov. 28 (UPI) -- A gun battle raged inside a Jewish community center in Mumbai Friday after Indian commandos stormed the terrorist-held facility, police said.

Paramilitary commandos dressed in blue uniforms slid down ropes from helicopters hovering over the Nariman House, home to an Orthodox Jewish group, and entered the building with guns blazing, the International Herald Tribune reported. The Jewish facility had been commandeered Wednesday by masked gunmen as part of a coordinated series of terrorist assaults mainly targeting luxury hotels in Mumbai's financial district.

No immediate word had been received on hostages presumed being held at the Nariman house. Snipers in nearby buildings peppered the building with bullets as the commandos were lowered shortly after dawn Friday, The Times of London said.

Commandos also combed trough the charred Taj Mahal and Oberoi hotels, battling remaining pockets of militants, with police officials saying the death toll from the attacks had reached 143 with the discovery of 24 bodies inside the Oberoi.

Those killed included six foreigners, at least a dozen police officers and the head of the city's anti-terrorism squad. More than 300 people were wounded in the indiscriminate firings and grenade-type explosions.

The head of the elite commando National Security Group told reporters Friday afternoon two of the remaining terrorists were killed at Oberoi and that the complex was now under government control.

The commandos also recovered unexploded grenades and AK-47 automatic rifles from the hotel, the Times of India reported, adding at least 148 rescued hostages, many of them foreigners, were seen leaving.

Separately, Mumbai Police Commissioner Hassan Gafoor was quoted as saying all hostages inside the massive century-old, 800-room landmark Hotel Taj had been evacuated. There had been another gun battle at the hotel after a night of similar battles and constantly raging fires.

Earlier, about 30 bodies were recovered from the Hotel Taj, the Times of India reported.

The BBC quoted security forces as saying the militants appeared to be familiar with the layout of the hotel. It said security forces recovered a Mauritius identity card as well as guns and money.

The Press Trust of India quoted Indian Cabinet Minister Kapil Sibal as telling local television the terrorists had meticulously planned the attack for months, conducting prior reconnaissance and even setting up "control rooms" at both hotels.

Some reports said the terrorists, some of them allegedly from neighboring Pakistan, entered Mumbai by sea.

Possible outside links to attackers eyed

MUMBAI, Nov. 28 (UPI) -- The scale and sophistication of the Mumbai terror attacks suggest the perpetrators received training outside the country, counterterrorism experts say.

Although cautioning it was still too soon to make any definitive assessments, experts told The Washington Post Muslim terror groups with links to Pakistan, long active in the disputed Kashmir region, are likely suspects in the Mumbai attacks, in which teams of heavily armed gunmen killed 130 people and wounded hundreds more.

"No indigenous Indian group has this level of capability," Bruce Riedel, a former South Asia analyst for the CIA and National Security Council, told the Post. "The goal is to damage the symbol of India's economic renaissance, undermine investor confidence and provoke an India-Pakistani crisis."

An unnamed U.S. counterterrorism official told the newspaper Lashkar-i-Taiba and Jaish-i-Muhammad, two terror groups based in Kashmir with alleged links to the Pakistan's intelligence services, may be behind the attacks.

That's "the thing people are starting to look at. But I can't caution enough to treat it as a theory, a working assumption. It's still too early for hard and fast" conclusions, he said, adding, "What the Indians have in their favor is that they've got some of these guys."

Thai protesters, police talk at airports

BANGKOK, Nov. 28 (UPI) -- Thai police said Friday they are negotiating with protesters occupying Bangkok's two major airports for the fourth straight day.

Police officials have sent in negotiators at Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi and Do Muang airports, hoping to avoid a violent invasion to disperse the protesters of the People's Alliance for Democracy, who have vowed to force the resignation of Thai Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat, The Guardian reported.

PAD members, including ordinary people camping out in the terminal areas and more militant protesters guarding roads leading to and from the airport, told the newspaper they had expected police to move against them overnight Friday after Somchai had declared national emergencies at the airports. But that didn't happen, with police indicating they would exhaust all efforts at negotiations first, the newspaper said.

"We are asking them to allow the airport to resume operations," Police Lt. Gen. Suchart Muenkaew, the chief negotiator, told reporters. "We will keep talking, but if it fails we will take other steps. The last step will be to disperse them."

PAD supporter Ra Werachon told The Times of London, "We are here for the Thai people, for our king. We aren't worried by this."

Black Friday starts annual retail rush

NEW YORK, Nov. 28 (UPI) -- Shoppers will be out in droves Friday, Saturday and Sunday, but the droves will be smaller than a year ago, a U.S. retail trade group said.

That National Retail Federation said 128 million U.S. shoppers will visit stores this weekend, starting with a rush for sales on Black Friday, named for the day that traditionally pushes U.S. stores into the black each year, USA Today reported Friday.

Bargain hunting is the name of the game. Google reported searches for "Black Friday" have risen 41 percent from a year ago while searches for "coupons" rose 59 percent. Searches for "free shipping" rose 11 percent, while "buy one get one free" searches rose 200 percent.

Amid the flurry of transactions, sales will diminish profits, retail consultant Janet Hoffman said.

"This weekend, we'll see very crowded malls, but whether that converts to real dollars, we don't know. I'm not confident we'll see real growth," said Hoffman, the global retail director for consulting firm Accenture.

Barbara Bush out of intensive care

HOUSTON, Nov. 28 (UPI) -- Former U.S. first lady Barbara Bush has been removed from intensive care and put into a regular hospital room after undergoing ulcer surgery, officials say.

Bush, 83, had surgery Tuesday to repair a perforated ulcer after arriving at the emergency room of Houston's Methodist Hospital complaining of severe abdominal pain, CNN reported. Bush was in good spirits and joking with staffers Thursday after the procedure, a hospital spokeswoman said.

Dr. Patrick Reardon, who performed the surgery, told reporters Wednesday he had cleaned the former first lady's abdominal cavity of contaminants that had leaked through the ulcer, which he described as being one centimeter in diameter.

Former U.S. President George H.W. Bush was at the hospital Thursday morning, but later left to attend Thanksgiving dinner with his son Neil, the hospital spokeswoman told CNN.

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