Crime

Study: Married heart patients more likely than singles to survive

January 12th, 20180 People with heart disease have better long-term survival odds when they are married, a recent U.S. study suggests. Compared to divorced, widowed and never-married peers, who were up to 71 percent more likely to die during a follow-up of several years, married patients also had fewer heart risk factors like high blood pressure and were...

Syrian army dismisses rebels claim of progress in Idlib province, continues offensives

January 12th, 20180 BEIRUT — Fighting raged in Idlib, where the Syrian government forces offensive has gathered pace in the last two weeks, according to rebels and a military media unit run by Lebanon's Hezbollah, which is fighting on the Syrian government side. Idlib province is the biggest chunk of Syria still held by rebels fighting the Syrian army,...

Israeli army kills two Palestinian youths in Gaza, West Bank

January 12th, 20180 GAZA — Two Palestinian youths were shot dead by Israeli troops during clashes on Thursday in the Gaza Strip and the Israeli-occupied West Bank, Palestinian medical sources and witnesses said. Israeli-Palestinian tensions have risen following President Trump's Dec. 6 recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital, a move that has...

Israel approves hundreds of new illegal settlement homes in the West Bank

January 12th, 20180 WEST BANK — The Israeli government has given its final approval for 352 homes in illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank, an anti-settlement movement said on Thursday — construction that Palestinians see as jeopardizing their prospects for an independent state. The Peace Now group said a meeting on Wednesday by a planning...

Saudi women-only auto show opens in Jeddah

January 12th, 20180 JEDDAH — Women flocked to Le Mall on Thursday to check out the kingdom's first car exhibition aimed at women, a few months after Saudi Arabia granted them the right to drive. Pink, orange and yellow balloons hung in the mall's showroom as women posed for photos and selfies in front of the cars. One woman in the driver's seat fixed...

Former Egyptian top general to run for president

January 12th, 20180 CAIRO — Former armed forces chief of staff General Sami Anan is to run in Egypt's presidential election in March, the party he leads said on Thursday. An election commission said on Monday Egypt would hold the vote on March 26-28, with a run-off on April 24-26. Candidates must register between Jan 20 and 29. "The party leaders...

Qatar: UAE aircraft violated our airspace

January 12th, 20180 DOHA — Qatar has filed a complaint to the United Nations about an alleged violation of its airspace in December by an Emirati military aircraft, state news agency QNA reported on Friday. The United Arab Emirates is one of four Arab countries, including Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Egypt, that have imposed travel, diplomatic and trade...

Macron tells Trump of need to abide by Iran nuclear deal

January 12th, 20180 PARIS — French President Emmanuel Macron stressed to President Trump in a telephone call on Thursday the importance of abiding by a nuclear deal with Iran ahead of a decision by the U.S. president that could reinstate sanctions on the country. "The president ... recalled France's determination in favor of a strict application of the...

Shadow armies: The unseen, but real U.S. war in Africa

January 12th, 20180 By Ramzy Baroud There is a real — but largely concealed — war which is taking place throughout the African continent. It involves the United States, an invigorated Russia and a rising China. The outcome of the war is likely to define the future of the continent and its global outlook. It is easy to pin the blame on President...

Ahed Tamimi offers Israelis a lesson worthy of Gandhi

January 12th, 20181 By Jonathan Cook Sixteen-year-old Ahed Tamimi may not be what Israelis had in mind when, over many years, they criticized Palestinians for not producing a Mahatma Gandhi or Nelson Mandela. Eventually, colonized peoples bring to the fore a figure best suited to challenge the rotten values at the core of the society oppressing them....

Damn it! This is cultural genocide, Tabouli is ours!

January 12th, 20180 By James Zogby Between Christmas and New Year's Day, I became embroiled in what The Jerusalem Post termed a "Twitter war", which it claimed "raised eyebrows on both sides of the Atlantic." What started the heated exchange was my response to a tweet by celebrity chef Rachael Ray in which she called "Israeli"—"meze, stuffed grape...

Ford urges 2,900 pickup owners to stop driving after new airbag death

January 12th, 20180 DEARBORN — The second largest U.S. automaker said it confirmed in late December that a July 2017 crash death in West Virginia in a 2006 Ford Ranger was caused by a defective Takata inflator. It previously reported a similar death in South Carolina that occurred in December 2015. Ford said both Takata deaths occurred with inflators...

Supreme Court considers putting brakes on police searching vehicles without warrant

January 12th, 20180 WASHINGTON, D.C. — On Tuesday, Supreme Court justices wrestled with the scope of police authority to search vehicles without warrants, with Chief Justice John Roberts referencing the shiny red convertible taken for a joyride in the 1986 comedy film "Ferris Bueller's Day Off" to make a serious legal point. The justices heard...

Judge blocks Trump move to end DACA program for immigrants

January 12th, 20180 SAN FRANCISCO — President Trump blasted the federal court system on Wednesday as "broken and unfair" after a judge blocked his administration's move to end a program protecting young immigrants brought to the United States illegally by their parents. A U.S. District Court judge in San Francisco ruled late on Tuesday that Deferred...

Bannon steps down from Breitbart News after drawing fire from Trump

January 12th, 20180 WASHINGTON, D.C. — Steve Bannon has stepped down as executive chairman of Breitbart News, the right-wing news website said on Tuesday, after the former White House chief strategist drew fire from President Trump for harshly criticizing his eldest son. Bannon was quoted in a new book about the Trump White House as calling Donald...

House passes NSA spying bill after Trump tweets cause confusion

January 12th, 20180 WASHINGTON, D.C. — On Thursday, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill to renew the National Security Agency's warrantless Internet surveillance program, overcoming objections from privacy advocates and confusion prompted by morning tweets from President Trump that initially questioned the spying tool. The legislation,...

Federal immigration operation targets 7-Eleven stores in 17 states

January 12th, 20180 WASHINGTON, D.C. — U.S. immigration agents fanned out to nearly 100 7-Eleven convenience stores nationwide on Wednesday, arresting 21 people suspected of being in the country illegally and giving owners a tight deadline to prove other employees are authorized to work. The operation was the largest worksite enforcement by U.S....

‘Changing of the guard’ taking place at both the Detroit FBI and the U.S. Attorney’s office

January 11th, 20180 TROY — A transition in leadership is taking place at both the FBI's Detroit office and in the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Michigan. David Gelios, special agent in charge of the FBI's Detroit office, is retiring on Jan. 31 to take a private sector job in San Diego. Gelios, who turns 57 in September, would...

10 things to avoid if you want to stay healthy this winter

January 5th, 20180 1. Sugar Avoid sugar, especially artificial sugars like aspartame. Sugar is in everything that comes in a package, from candy bars to even the "healthy" items like granola bars. Sugar is a huge threat to the body because it weakens the immune system. When the immune system is weak your body has to work harder and this puts it in a...

Iran’s unrest: The government turns the tide

January 5th, 20180 Huge pro-government rallies sweep major Iranian cities where tens of thousands of supporters waved Iranian flags and pictures of supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, as well as placards saying "death to seditionists." TEHRAN — Iran's Revolutionary Guards chief announced the "end of the sedition" Wednesday as hundreds of thousands...

Trump threatens to withhold humanitarian aid to Palestinian refugees

January 5th, 20180 UNITED NATIONS — President Trump said in tweets on Tuesday that the United States may withhold future aid payments to Palestinians, accusing them of being "no longer willing to talk peace" with Israel. Trump said that Washington gives Palestinians "HUNDRED OF MILLIONS OF DOLLARS a year and gets no appreciation or respect. They don't...

Israel offers African migrants money to leave or face imprisonment

January 5th, 20180 TEL AVIV — Israel said on Wednesday it would pay thousands of African migrants living illegally in the country to leave, threatening them with jail if they are caught after the end of March. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in public remarks at a cabinet meeting on the payment program, said a barrier Israel completed in 2013 along...

Russia denies report that seven planes were destroyed in Syria attack

January 5th, 20180 MOSCOW — Russia denied a report in daily newspaper Kommersant that seven Russian planes had been destroyed by rebel shelling at Syria's Hmeymim air base on Dec. 31, the TASS news agency quoted the defense ministry as saying on Thursday. At least four Su-24 bombers, two Su-35S fighters and an An-72 transport plane, as well as an...

WHO: Suspected diphtheria cases in Yemen near 500

January 5th, 20180 GENEVA — At least 471 people in Yemen are believed to have been infected with diphtheria, killing one in 10 of them since the outbreak began in mid-August, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Thursday. Yemen, one of the Arab world's poorest countries, is embroiled in a proxy war between the Houthi armed movement, allied with...

Will 2018 usher in a new Palestinian strategy?

January 5th, 20180 By Ramzy Baroud 2017 will be remembered as the year that the so-called "peace process", at least in its American formulation, ended. And with its demise, a political framework that has served as the foundation for U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East has also collapsed. The Palestinian leadership and its Arab and international...