Nine held over Jerusalem wedding tragedy
Nine people arrested in connection with the collapse of a wedding banquet hall in Jerusalem are to be held for several more days.
The nine are being held amid suspicion that faulty construction and renovation work were responsible for the cave-in. They include the building's owners, contractors and their associates.
They made their first court appearance Saturday night, hours after rescue workers called off the search for survivors.
The hearing, which lasted over two and a half hours, was disrupted at the end by a car bomb that exploded in a parking lot near the Jerusalem magistrates' court, which was thought to be planted by Palestinian terrorists.
Despite the disturbance, the judge ordered seven of the nine held until Thursday. Two people suspected of having tried to obstruct the investigation were ordered held until Tuesday.
The top floor of the Versailles wedding hall buckled on Thursday night, sending hundreds of Assi and Keren Sror's 600 wedding guests plunging three storeys into a pit of concrete slabs and twisted metal.
After picking through the ruins for 42 hours, rescue crews called off the search for survivors and held a memorial service at the site, despite conflicting claims about whether all employees attending to the guests were accounted for.
Twenty-three bodies were pulled out of the ruins on Friday. Of the more than 300 injured, about 150 remained in hospital on Saturday. More than a dozen were in serious condition.
