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August 23, 2017 at 10:38 am
Iran’s new telecommunications minister says Twitter is ready to talk about unblocking access to the microblogging site.
The state-owned IRAN newspaper quoted Mohammad Javad Azari Jahromi on Tuesday as saying Twitter has “officially announced readiness to talk with Iran for resolving the problems.”
San Francisco-based Twitter declined to comment.
Iran blocked the site, along with Facebook and YouTube, after mass protests and violence over the 2009 re-election of hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
Iran’s Supreme Council of Cyberspace, headed by current President Hassan Rouhani, officially is in charge of blocking websites. That council is overseen by Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
Ahmadinejad, Rouhani and Khamenei all have Twitter...
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August 23, 2017 at 10:38 am
North Korea on Tuesday described President Donald Trump as a leader who frequently tweets “weird articles of his ego-driven thoughts” and “spouts rubbish” to give his assistants a hard time.
The North’s official Korean Central News Agency made the comments in response to tough talk in Washington and Seoul over threats posed by Pyongyang’s nuclear and missile programs.
In the same commentary, KCNA also criticized South Korea’s “puppy-like” Defense Minister Song Young-moo, who it said was “running wild” while relying on the “master of the White House.” Song recently ordered the South’s military to be prepared to “immediately and sternly punish” any kind of provocation by North Korea, which has c...
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August 23, 2017 at 10:37 am
Four alleged members of a terror cell accused of killing 15 people in attacks in Barcelona and a nearby resort appeared in court Tuesday, a day after the last missing member of the cell was gunned down by police.
The four men were arrested last week for their alleged involvement in planning or carrying out vehicle attacks on pedestrians in Barcelona on Thursday and the northeastern town of Cambrils early Friday.
Mohamed Houli Chemlal, a 21 year-old arrested after he survived an explosion at a house in eastern Spain last week, was the first to testify before National Court Judge Fernando Andreu in Madrid. Andreu will decide whether the four should be jailed or released.
Chemlal’s testimony is considered key to understanding the motivations of the 12-man cell that killed 15 people a...
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August 23, 2017 at 10:37 am
20 Israeli citizens fighting for ISIS in Syria, including several who were born Jewish.
The Shin Bet intelligence agency has gathered information about 20 Israelis who joined the ranks of the ISIS terrorist organization in Syria, Channel 2 News reported.
The vast majority of the Israeli citizens who joined ISIS were Israeli Arabs. However, two of the terrorist group's Israeli recruits were born Jewish, although it is not known if they are halakhically so. The two had immigrated to Israel from the former Soviet Union and later changed their religion. They are currently listed as Muslims in the national registry.
Another Israeli who joined ISIS is an Israeli Arab from Fureidis in northern Israel who served in the IDF in the past, and decided to fight for ISIS in Syria...
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August 23, 2017 at 10:30 am
Laying out his new Afghanistan war strategy, President Donald Trump reissued old demands on neighboring Pakistan to eliminate militant sanctuaries. Less expected: an entirely new warning to close U.S. partner India to provide more economic aid.
Much of Trump’s eagerly awaited address on turning around the nation’s longest war sounded familiar, not least the need for Pakistan to crack down on Taliban fighters hiding across Afghanistan’s borders. Washington has clamored for greater Pakistani action for years.
More surprising was Trump’s blunt challenge to India and how he linked Afghanistan’s economic revitalization to totally separate U.S.-Indian trade matters.
“We appreciate India’s important contributions to stability in Afghanistan, but India ...
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August 23, 2017 at 10:28 am
Just a day ahead of his Wednesday departure for Russia, where he will meet with President Vladimir Putin, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu issued a warning pertaining to increased Iranian involvement in Syria and Lebanon, stating this reality could result in a regional conflict.
PM Netanyahu will be flying to Russia on Wednesday, 2 Rosh Chodesh Elul, accompanied by Mossad Director Yossi Cohen. They will be meeting with President Putting in the Black Sea resort town of Sochi. It is reported the focus of their talks will surround ongoing Iranian involvement in Syria and Lebanon, which has Jerusalem concerned. In fact, Cohen was just in Washington last week, accompanied by Chief of Military Intelligence Major-General Herzl Halevy. They met with officials there to issue the same warning rega...
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August 23, 2017 at 10:19 am
On Sunday, York Regional Police were called to three different schools in Markham, each of which had been vandalized with anti-Semitic and racist graffiti.
The messages referenced the KKK and “white power” and also compared the Jewish Star of David symbol to a swastika.
Families bringing their children to play in the school yard made the shocking discovery at William Armstrong Public School. Similar graffiti was found at Reesor Park P.S. and at Markham District High School.
Police believe the same suspects are responsible for all three incidents.
York Regional Police Insp. Alvara Almeida said investigators believe the incidents are connected.
“We’ve been investigating throughout the day and as early as 6 p.m. this evening, we’ve determined that all three ...
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August 23, 2017 at 9:54 am
A Houston man has been arrested after being accused by authorities of trying to damage or destroy a Confederate statue at a Houston park with explosives.
Federal prosecutors said Monday 25-year-old Andrew Schneck had been charged with attempting to maliciously damage or destroy property receiving federal financial assistance.
Authorities say a Houston park ranger on Saturday caught Schneck kneeling near a statue of Richard Dowling, a lieutenant in the Confederate army, located in Hermann Park.
Prosecutors say Schneck was caught with two boxes with duct tape and wires and with a bottle containing a liquid made up of compounds used as explosives.
Philip Hilder, Schneck’s attorney, declined to comment on Monday.
Schneck received five years of probation after pleading guilty in 2014...
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August 23, 2017 at 9:52 am
The Trump administration on Tuesday imposed sanctions on 16 mainly Chinese and Russian companies and people for assisting North Korea’s nuclear and ballistic missile programs and helping the North make money to support those programs.
The penalties are intended to complement new U.N. Security Council sanctions and further isolate North Korea for its nuclear and missile tests amid heightened tensions that have led to threats from both sides, the Treasury Department said in a statement. The 16 affected entities either do business with previously sanctioned companies and people, work with the North Korean energy sector, help it place workers abroad or facilitate its evasion of international financial curbs.
The measures block any assets they may have in U.S. jurisdictions and bar Amer...
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August 23, 2017 at 9:50 am
An empty New Jersey Transit train derailed early Wednesday in Manhattan’s Penn Station, causing some delays at the beginning of the morning rush hour.
An Amtrak crew was moving a New Jersey Transit train out of a railyard around 5 a.m. when some cars derailed on Track 4, where repair work started earlier this summer, according to NJ Transit spokeswoman Penny Bassett.
The derailed cars were cleared by 6:20 a.m.
NJ Transit’s Northeast Corridor, North Jersey Coast, Montclair-Boonton and Midtown Direct trains initially had 20-minute delays but were back on schedule quickly. The Long Island Rail Road and city subways were not affected, according to New York’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority.
A linchpin in the northeastern U.S. rail system, Penn Station, which is owne...
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August 23, 2017 at 9:43 am
A day of noisy but largely peaceful protests of President Donald Trump’s speech in Phoenix turned unruly as police fired pepper spray at crowds after someone apparently lobbed rocks and bottles at officers.
A haze enveloped the night sky Tuesday as protesters and police clashed outside the convention center where Trump had just wrapped up his speech. People fled the scene coughing as an officer in a helicopter bellowed through a speaker urging protesters to leave the area.
Officers responded with pepper spray to break up the crowd after people tossed rocks and bottles and dispersed gas, Phoenix police spokesman Jonathan Howard said. Four people were arrested on charges related to the protest, and one person was arrested on an unrelated warrant, Police Chief Jeri Williams said. Two ...
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August 23, 2017 at 9:40 am
President Donald Trump opened his political rally in Phoenix with calls for unity and an assertion that “our movement is about love.” Then he erupted in anger.
He blamed the media for the widespread condemnation of his response to violence at a Charlottesville, Virginia, protest organized by white supremacists. And he shouted that he had “openly called for healing, unity and love” in the immediate aftermath of the tragedy and had simply been misrepresented in news coverage.
He read from his three responses to the racially charged violence – getting more animated with each one. He withdrew from his suit pocket the written statement he’d read the day a woman was killed by a man who’d plowed a car through counter-protesters, but he skipped over the ...
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August 23, 2017 at 9:40 am
The Jerusalem municipality confiscated a truck that dumped building waste and fined its owner NIS 20,000 in its battle against illegal dumping.
The municipality of Jerusalem is working to eliminate the pirate dumping construction waste throughout the city: During the activity of the municipal enforcement and policing teams in the Jabil Mukhaber area, a truck was seen hurling construction waste in an open area. The municipal enforcement and policing team detained the truck driver and carried out a procedure to confiscate the truck. During his interrogation, the truck driver connected himself to another 17 dumps and admitted all the offenses attributed to him for this offense.
In light of the findings, the owner of the truck was required to clear all the waste he had dumped into the Kaland...
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August 23, 2017 at 9:39 am
Verizon is raising the price of its unlimited plan while introducing a slightly cheaper, more limited version as wireless carriers battle each other for customers.
All major carriers now offer unlimited plans after years of steering people toward paying extra for using more data. Verizon, like its rivals, will start charging more for higher-quality video while hoping to attract cost-conscious customers with a cheaper plan.
Verizon’s unlimited plan had cost $80 for one line. Beginning Wednesday, with HD video — capped at 720p for phones — it’ll cost $85, while plans with DVD-quality streaming will cost $75. For a family of four, the “premium” version costs $275; the cheaper plan is $230.
Existing customers can keep their unlimited plans, but their vide...
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August 23, 2017 at 9:38 am
North Korea’s envoy to U.N. disarmament talks says “military threats and pressure” from the United States are only serving to drive his country to further develop a nuclear deterrence.
Diplomat Ju Yong Chol said Tuesday that other countries which spoke at a Conference on Disarmament session against Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons and missile tests had been siding with the “hostile” U.S. position.
Ju accused Washington of attempting to “shift the blame for the tense situation on the Korean Peninsula to DPRK.”
U.S. ambassador Robert Wood warned that North Korea’s ballistic-missile and nuclear-weapons programs “pose grave threats to the entire world” and said its recent intercontinental ballistic missile tests had showed “...
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August 23, 2017 at 9:37 am
A dangerous Takata air bag should have been recalled before going from a wrecked car to a salvage yard, eventually ending up in a 2002 Honda Accord and nearly killing a Las Vegas woman, a lawsuit alleges.
The Accord had been fixed up and sold in March of 2016 to the family of Karina Dorado, a 19-year-old woman whose trachea was punctured by shrapnel spewed by the faulty air bag. The family claims it was never informed that the air bag was subject to a recall.
How that air bag got into the Accord is detailed in the lawsuit filed Friday in Nevada. It highlights the sometimes suspect world of auto parts recycling and shows how dangerous recalled parts can find their way into used cars that are sold to unsuspecting buyers.
It’s unclear just how many faulty Takata inflators are being u...
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August 23, 2017 at 9:30 am
The White House is appealing to the news media for privacy for President Donald Trump’s young son, Barron.
Stephanie Grisham, a spokesman for first lady Melania Trump, says the 11-year-old “deserves every opportunity to have a private childhood.”
The request follows criticism of Barron in a column published by The Daily Caller, a conservative website.
The column criticized the boy’s attire of shorts, a T-shirt that said “On Your Mark Tiger Shark” and loafers without socks for Sunday’s return trip to the White House after summer vacation at the family’s home on Trump’s private golf club in central New Jersey.
Springer wrote that since Barron doesn’t have any responsibilities as the president’s son, he could at least dress...
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August 23, 2017 at 9:25 am
White House adviser Jared Kushner is leading a delegation to the Middle East on behalf of President Donald Trump to discuss the possibility of resuming the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.
A White House official said Kushner, the president’s son-in-law, left Sunday along with Jason Greenblatt, envoy for international negotiations, and Dina Powell, deputy national security adviser.
They were in the Persian Gulf on Tuesday and expected to be in Israel on Wednesday, the official said. They were planning to meet separately with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Thursday.
The official was not authorized to publicly discuss the private meetings and spoke on condition of anonymity.
The three were expected to meet leaders from Saudi Ar...
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August 23, 2017 at 9:14 am
The relationship between President Trump and Senator Mitch McConnell, the majority leader, has disintegrated to the point that they have not spoken to each other in weeks, and Mr. McConnell has privately expressed uncertainty that Mr. Trump will be able to salvage his administration after a series of summer crises.
What was once an uneasy governing alliance has curdled into a feud of mutual resentment and sometimes outright hostility, complicated by the position of Mr. McConnell’s wife, Elaine L. Chao, in Mr. Trump’s cabinet, according to more than a dozen people briefed on their imperiled partnership. Angry phone calls and private badmouthing have devolved into open conflict, with the president threatening to oppose Republican senators who cross him, and Mr. McConnel...
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August 23, 2017 at 9:13 am
Jerusalem Arab with knife caught at light rail stop near Meah Shearim.
An Arab resident of Jerusalem was arrested Wednesday morning, after police found he was carrying a concealed knife while waiting for the light rail train.
The suspect was first spotted by a light rail security guard at the Shivtei Yisrael station near Meah Shearim. The guard promptly alerted police to the suspicious individual.
Officers quickly responded to the call, and detained the suspect for questioning. During a search of his person, police found a knife the suspect had concealed.
