Elephant hurts girl in Israel, bear kills man in Romania

Israeli officials say a 17-year-old girl who sneaked into a zoo at night with a friend was attacked by an elephant and hospitalized.

An employee of the Safari nature park near Tel Aviv says the couple entered the park before dawn Friday by climbing over a wall, and then entered the elephants' enclosure.

Mori Hertzenstein told Army Radio that the girl then approached the pen of one of the male elephants, who grabbed her with his trunk. Hertzenstein said "the elephant, which is a giant animal, hurt her."

Israeli rescue services say the girl was found outside the elephant's pen with injuries to her chest, stomach and pelvis and was rushed to hospital. Her friend was questioned by police.

In the meantime, a bear has killed a man about 500 yards (meters) from the center of a city in Transylvania, Romania.

Adriana Dontu, a government official for the region, said a man walking his dog found the body of a 25-year-old man early Friday.

Dontu said the bear had mauled the man in a pedestrian area at a park near the city center. The bear then dragged the body a few meters (yards) to a forest bordering the park.

Three teams of hunters were sent to search for the bear.

Sightings of bears in the Brasov region of Transylvania are common; the animals enter cities in search of food. There have been occasional attacks on humans.