Death toll crosses 800 in Gaza conflict - Hindustan Times

Israeli fire killed four people in Gaza Friday, including a pregnant woman, bringing the total death toll to more than 800, Palestinian emergency services spokesman Ashraf al-Qudra said.

He said that an air strike on a house in the southern Gaza town of Deir-el-Balah killed a woman of 26 and another aged 23 who was pregnant, as Israel pressed on with its 18-day campaign to stamp out Gaza rocket fire.

The baby was saved, he said.

Two other people wounded earlier in shelling of the southern city of Khan Yunis, died of their injuries, he said, bringing the total number of Gazans killed in the Israeli campaign to 804.

Nearly 100 Palestinians were killed on Thursday, according to Qudra, one of the bloodiest days of the conflict.

Projectiles fired into Israel have killed three civilians -- two Israelis and a Thai migrant worker -- and fighting in and around Gaza has killed 32 Israeli soldiers.

It is the bloodiest conflict in the besieged Palestinian territory since a 2009 military operation there.

NGOs put the Palestinian civilian toll at around 80% of total casualties, including a large number of women and children.

"We are gravely concerned by the ongoing heavy level of civilian causalities," British foreign secretary Philip Hammond said at a press conference in Jerusalem with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, at which he also defended Israel's right to self-defence in the face of a conflict triggered by Hamas rocket fire.

Fifteen people were killed Thursday when Israeli fire hit a UN shelter in Gaza.

Emergency services spokesperson Ashraf al-Qudra said at least 15 people had been killed and 200 wounded by Israeli shelling of a school run by the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) in the northern town of Beit Hanun, where hundreds of civilians had sought refuge from the violence.

He gave no immediate details of those killed, but an AFP correspondent reported that a mother and her one-year-old infant were among the dead brought into a nearby mortuary.

Earlier Thursday, US airlines lifted a flight ban to Israel, with other international airlines expected to follow suit.

The US national aviation agency had imposed the restriction on Tuesday after a rocket hit a house very close to the runways, in a move mirrored by Europe.

It was renewed late on Wednesday, prompting Hamas, the de facto power in Gaza, to hail the suspension of Tel Aviv flights as a "great victory for the resistance."

US secretary of state John Kerry Thursday pressed efforts to end bloodshed in Gaza, reaching out to allies of Hamas as the Islamist movement's war with Israel raged into a 17th day.

Kerry -- who is in Egypt, which has drafted a truce proposal for the Israel-Hamas conflict -- spoke by phone with the foreign ministers of Qatar and Turkey, a US official said.

Hamas chief Khaled Meshaal is based in Qatar, while Turkey's Islamist-oriented Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has harshly criticised Israel's assault on Hamas-ruled Gaza as well as Egypt's role in trying to clinch a ceasefire.

A US official said Kerry was hoping Qatar and Turkey would use their influence to encourage Hamas to accept a ceasefire plan, which the Islamist group has so far rejected.

Meshaal vowed late on Wednesday there would be no end to the fighting without the lifting of Israel's eight-year blockade on Gaza.

Khuzaa under fire
There was no let-up to the violence in Gaza, however, with most of Thursday's 51 victims killed in and around Khuzaa, a flashpoint area east of Khan Yunis which has been the site of intensive fighting since Tuesday.

Gaza's health ministry issued a call for international protection for civilians in the area, saying anyone leaving home was being targeted by Israeli fire.

On Wednesday, the Red Cross and Palestinian ambulances managed to evacuate 150 people from the area following negotiations with both sides, and another convoy of 10 ambulances entered the area early on Thursday, an ICRC spokesperson told AFP.

In Jabaliya refugee camp, residents gathered at first light to examine the damage after an air strike destroyed houses and a mosque.

'Grotesque, inhuman'
Netanyahu said Israel was doing everything it could to minimise casualties, pinning the blame on Hamas for its "grotesque (and) inhuman" use of civilians as human shields.

Hammond then flew to Cairo where he was due to hold talks with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi.

UN chief Ban Ki-moon was also in Egypt and Israel earlier this week, in the hope of hammering out a regional truce deal, with Kerry acknowledging there had been "some progress in moving toward that goal."

On a whirlwind visit, Kerry on Wednesday met Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas in the West Bank city of Ramallah then held a two-hour meeting in Tel Aviv with Netanyahu before flying back to the Egyptian capital.

So far, 32 Israeli soldiers and three civilians have died in the fighting, one of whom was a Thai farm labourer who was killed when a rocket struck the greenhouse where he was working in southern Israel.

Following his death, Bangkok demanded Israel "immediately" relocate 4,000 Thai nationals working near the Gaza Strip to areas safe from the fighting, a foreign ministry spokesman said.

(With inputs from Reuters, AFP and AP)

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US Considering Refugee Status for Hondurans - New York Times

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Sisters and a friend from Honduras, ages 13, 14 and 16, along Mexico’s southern border this month, en route to the United States. Credit Meridith Kohut for The New York Times

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Hoping to stem the recent surge of migrants at the Southwest border, the Obama administration is considering whether to allow hundreds of minors and young adults from Honduras into the United States without making the dangerous trek through Mexico, according to a draft of the proposal.

If approved, the plan would direct the government to screen thousands of children and youths in Honduras to see if they can enter the United States as refugees or on emergency humanitarian grounds. It would be the first American refugee effort in a nation reachable by land to the United States, the White House said, putting the violence in Honduras on the level of humanitarian emergencies in Haiti and Vietnam, where such programs have been conducted in the past amid war and major crises.

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Critics of the plan were quick to pounce, saying it appeared to redefine the legal definition of a refugee and would only increase the flow of migration to the United States. Administration officials said they believed the plan could be enacted through executive action, without congressional approval, as long as it did not increase the total number of refugees coming into the country.

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The number of children crossing the U.S. border alone has doubled since last year. Answers to key questions on the crisis.

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By moving decisions on refugee claims to Honduras, the plan aims to slow the rush of minors crossing into the United States illegally from El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala, which has overwhelmed the border this year. More than 45,000 unaccompanied minors from those three nations have arrived since Oct. 1, straining federal resources to the point that some agencies will exhaust their budgets by next month, the secretary of Homeland Security has said.

Many of the children, particularly in Honduras, are believed to be fleeing dangerous street gangs, which forcibly recruit members and extort home and business owners. The United Nations estimates that 70,000 gang members operate in the three nations.

Administration officials stressed that no decision had been made to move forward, saying the idea was one of many being discussed by officials at the White House and the Departments of State, Homeland Security, Justice, and Health and Human Services.

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Among the factors surrounding the decision are how many people in Honduras would be eligible to apply for the program, and how many would probably be approved.

The proposal, prepared by several federal agencies, says the pilot program under consideration would cost up to $47 million over two years, assuming 5,000 applied and about 1,750 people were accepted. If successful, it would be adopted in Guatemala and El Salvador as well.

It is unclear how the administration determined those estimates, given that since Oct. 1 more than 16,500 unaccompanied children traveled to the United States from Honduras alone.

Children would be interviewed by American immigration employees trained to deal with minors, and a resettlement center would be set up in the Honduran capital, Tegucigalpa, with assistance from international organizations like the International Organization for Migration.

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The plan would be similar to a recent bill introduced by Senators John McCain and Jeff Flake of Arizona, who proposed increasing the number of refugee visas to the three Central American countries by 5,000 each.

According to the draft, the administration is considering opening the program to people under 21. It also suggested offering entry on emergency humanitarian grounds — known as humanitarian parole — to some of the applicants who did not qualify for refugee status.

Photo

A crime scene in San Pedro Sula, Honduras, where a 7-year-old was found tortured and murdered. Credit Meridith Kohut for The New York Times

That would most likely cause an outcry among critics who believe President Obama has been too soft on immigration. But officials called it “highly unlikely” that people who were denied refugee status would be considered for parole, which is generally offered in isolated emergencies.

Mark Krikorian, the executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies, which supports tighter controls on immigration, said that the proposal would increase, not stem, the flood of migrants from Central America trying to get into the United States.

“It’s clearly a bad idea,” Mr. Krikorian said. “Orders of magnitude more people will apply for refugee status if they can just do it from their home countries.”

He added that the proposal would allow people to claim to be refugees from their countries with “nothing more than a bus ride to the consulate. We’re talking about, down the road, an enormous additional flow of people from those countries.”

The preliminary plan could create a thorny challenge for the administration because the definition of a refugee is legally specific, and children fleeing street gangs could have a hard time qualifying.

Under American law, refugees are people fleeing their country of origin based on fears of persecution by reason of race, religion, nationality, political opinion or membership in a particular social group.

The only category that would seem to apply is “social group,” experts said, but there is disagreement on what that means. Some contend that children could count as a group, but others say the refugee requirements are stricter, and would not apply to people fleeing general crime and violence.

“What is a social group?” said Muzaffar Chishti, director of migration policies for the Migration Policy Institute’s New York office. “This is going to create a huge deal of debate. You will see a lot of law developing on it.”

Still, the draft of the plan noted that 64.7 percent of the unaccompanied minors who applied for asylum this year got it, which suggests that immigration officials have found their claims of imminent danger credible.

Photo

Migrants traveling north through Mexico toward the United States on a northbound freight train known as “The Beast,” because of rampant accidents and violent crime. Credit Meridith Kohut for The New York Times

With that in mind, the draft proposal suggested that 35 percent to 50 percent of the applicants in Honduras could be considered for relief, a figure the White House said was inflated. The early draft, the White House said, was the most generous and least likely of the options the administration is considering. How many people are accepted is critical, because refugees qualify for public assistance upon arrival in the United States.

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One of the issues under debate is whether the program should be limited to children who have at least one relative in the United States, so that the government would not be saddled with custodial issues. Whether that relative would have to have legal residency is another issue that was addressed but not resolved.

Under Senator McCain’s proposal, refugee applicants would be processed at home, and child migrants arriving in the United States illegally could be deported quickly.

Kevin Appleby, director of Migration and Refugee Services at the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, said the plan would be welcome, as long as it did not substitute for protections Central American children currently receive under American law.

“This program would certainly be a formal acknowledgment by the administration that these children are refugees,” Mr. Appleby said. “That’s huge, because they have yet to utter that word.”

When a similar plan was adopted in Haiti, as a way to keep people from taking to the high seas, he said, it was ultimately criticized because Haitians already in the United States did not receive help. “It ended up being counterproductive to the goal,” Mr. Appleby said.

Stacie Blake, the director of government relations for the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants, an advocacy group, said the processing of potential refugees in Central America could be handled by the United States or by the United Nations, which makes refugee determinations in many other countries. She said some of the people designated as refugees in Honduras could end up in countries other than the United States.

“It’s a way to help folks avoid life-threatening escapes and journeys,” Ms. Blake said. “It’s a good idea. It’s a tested idea.”

The Honduran Foreign Ministry referred requests for comment to its embassy in Washington, which said that, due to the president’s visit to Washington, its ambassador was not immediately available for comment.

On Friday, Mr. Obama is scheduled to meet with the presidents of Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador at the White House in an effort to urge the Central American leaders to do more to help stem the flow of children fleeing their countries for the United States.

Julia Preston contributed reporting.

A version of this article appears in print on July 25, 2014, on page A1 of the New York edition with the headline: U.S. Considering Refugee Status for Hondurans.

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Kerry, European leaders push for new sanctions on Russia - USA TODAY

Ukrainian emergency workers walk by charred debris at the crash site of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 near the village of Hrabove, eastern Ukraine, on July 20, 2014.(Photo: Vadim Ghirda, AP)

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Secretary of State John Kerry said Sunday that there was mounting evidence Russia assisted separatists in Ukraine in shooting down Malaysia Airlines Flight 17. European leaders and members of Congress also called for new sanctions to be put into place.

"We know for certain that in the last month there's been a major flow of personnel and weapons," including a convoy of 150 vehicles including 150 tanks and armored personnel carriers, Kerry said on CNN's State of the Union, one of five Sunday shows he appeared on. "At the moment of the shoot-down, we detected a launch from that area," Kerry said. "The trajectory went through that plane."

Asked whether Russia provided the weapon, Kerry told NBC's Meet the Press that the administration is unprepared to make that concrete assertion. "We are not drawing the final conclusion here, but there's a lot (of evidence) to believe that Russia is responsible," he said.

Kerry told Fox News Sunday he is trying to convince European countries to hit Russia with tougher sanctions and talking to Ukraine about increasing U.S. aid to its military. "What we are doing now is trying to bring our European counterparts along," Kerry said.

Leaders in Europe said they would discuss sanctions when they meet Tuesday for the first time since Flight MH17 was shot down, according to press reports.

United Kingdom Prime Minister David Cameron, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Francois Hollande agreed in a phone conversation that the European Union should ready new sanctions and urge Russia to ensure access to the crash site, a spokesman for the U.K. government told Sky News.

"They agreed President Putin has an important role to play by persuading the separatists to grant access and to work with the international community to ensure that all that needs to be done can be done as soon as possible," the spokesman said. "They also agreed that the EU must reconsider its approach to Russia."

Cameron wrote in the Sunday Times that some of his European counterparts need to get over their reluctance to take strong action against Russia. "If Vladimir Putin does not change his approach to Ukraine then Europe and the West must fundamentally change our approach to Russia," Cameron wrote. "This is not about military action, plainly. But it is time to make our power, influence and resources count."

On ABC's This Week, Rep. Mike Rogers, chairman of the House Select Committee on Intelligence, said the missile system had Russian hands on it "at least at some point."

"We need our European allies to step up (their) opportunity to put really tough sanctions," he said.

On CNN, Sen. Dianne Feinstein, a Democrat from California who heads the Intelligence Committee, said: "I think the world has to rise up and say, 'We've had enough of this.' I think Europe has to come together. I think Germany in particular has to lead. I think we have to continue with sanctions."

USATODAY

Reports: Intel points to Russia as likely missile supplier

On CNN, Kerry also said social media posts have provided a lot of information, including photographs of a BUK missile system in the area of the shoot-down, and a photo of such a system leaving the area with one missile missing.

A leader of the separatists' Donetsk People's Republic bragged on his website that rebels shot down a Ukrainian military transport in the moments after the shoot-down, and then removed the post after it became clear the flight was a civilian airliner, Kerry said.

"So it obviously points a very clear finger at the separatists," he said.

Kerry stopped short of saying Russia is responsible for the deaths of 298 crewmembers and passengers on the flight, but said the world, and European countries in particular, need to take stronger action against it.

"It would help enormously if some countries in Europe (that have not wanted to join sanctions) would get on board and step up," he said.

Kerry's comments come as anger mounts across the globe over the way the scene and the remains have been handled. There have been increasing calls for Putin to intervene.

"I am shocked by the images of utterly disrespectful behavior at the crash site — violating the rules of any investigation, there are people fooling around amid the debris, and picking through the personal and recognizable items of the victims," said Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte, whose country lost 193 people. "This is utterly disgusting."

Rutte said he had an "intense" conversation with Putin on Sunday morning and that he told Putin "time is running out" on his offer to help force the rebels in Ukraine to cooperate with the investigation.

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Who Did It? What We Know About the Ukraine Jet Crash - NBCNews.com

Two days after Malaysian Airlines Flight 17 was shot down over contested Ukrainian territory, killing all 298 people on board, many questions surrounding the horrific tragedy remain unanswered.

Who did it?

The most important question is that of responsibility. Three parties are possible: Pro-Russian separatists in Ukraine, Russian regular army soldiers operating on the wrong side of the border, or Ukrainian military elements fighting the first two.

President Obama on Friday said that the surface to air missile that downed the jet was fired from a location under control of the separatists. That doesn’t necessarily mean it wasn’t fired by Russian or Ukrainian army operating in the region -- although pro-Russian units have down several Ukrainian planes in the same fashion, including a AN-26 military transport on Monday.

Both sides have blamed each other, but everyone agrees that it was a Russian-made SA-11 Buk missile. The simple fact that it was Russian-made, however, doesn’t rule out Ukrainian use, as the country has always relied heavily on its former Soviet partner for its weaponry. U.S. intelligence officials have told NBC News that they believe the missile launcher originally belonged to Ukrainian forces but was seized by separatists.

And Ambassador Samantha Power at the U.N. Security Council on Friday said that the aircraft was "likely downed by a surface-to-air missile, an SA-11, operated from a separatist-held location in eastern Ukraine."

Meanwhile U.S. officials have long believed that Moscow is pulling the separatists’ strings – although President Vladimir Putin insists that the militia men are not within his control.

Pentagon spokesman Rear Admiral John Kirby told reporters on Friday that "it strains credulity to think that (the missile) could be used by separatists without at least some measure of Russian support and technical assistance."

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How will the investigation proceed?

With wreckage strewn across a six square miles in the remote — and dangerous — area of Eastern Ukraine, it’s unclear if international investigators will be fully able to do their jobs. Separatists have a tenuous grip on the region, and there were reports of gunfire even after the crash.

There were reports that the pro-Russian militia men had taken the plane’s black boxes. Separatist leader Aleksandr Borodai first told the Associated Press that they didn't have them, then one of his aides said eight devices had been found -- but a Boeing 777 would typically only have two black boxes. If the separatists do have the black boxes, it's unclear what they will do with them.

President Obama on Friday insisted that the rebels allow international investigators access to the area, and one lone agent with the NTSB and two FBI agents were sent to the area.

But unlike more mysterious airline disasters where planes disappear or fall to Earth for unknown reasons, the basic cause of MH17’s demise is fairly certain.

"What the NTSB investigators come up with isn't going to be the most relevant piece,” said Michael Leiter, NBC News National Security Analyst. “Far more important is the intelligence piece. What we see form overhead imagery and the like about where this missile came from and who fired it."

ANASTASIA VLASOVA / EPA

Armed pro-Russian militants pass next to the wreckage of a Boeing 777, of Malaysia Arilines flight MH17 debris, which crashed during flight over the eastern Ukraine region near Donetsk, Ukraine, 18 July 2014.

Could the pilots have done anything to save the plane?

A major goal of any investigation is always to prevent future disasters, but there’s not likely much the pilots could have done.

"They had zero warning, zero -- They were in the middle of a word and they were gone. That’s how quick it was,” Anthony Roman, an aviation and security expert and former commercial pilot and flight instructor, told NBC News on Friday. "There are no systems on a commercial airliner that can detect a military missile. There is no possibility, there is a very low likely hood they even saw it. It’s travelling at three times the speed of sound.”

Even given the outside possibility the pilots had seen the missile coming right at them, there would still no hope.

"A triple seven is like a lumbering cargo plane, you start to turn it and she takes her time," said Roman.

But why were they flying over such a dangerous area in the first place?

Some have pointed blame at the flight plan, saying that commercial aircraft shouldn’t be flying over Eastern Ukraine, which is turning into a war zone. Malaysia Airlines officials pointed out that 55 flights took the same route the day before and it had been approved by international authorities -- but way back in April the FAA had prohibited U.S. airlines from flying over Crimea, which is near by.

After Thursday’s crash, that order was expanded to cover Eastern Ukraine.

"I find it pretty remarkable that a civil airline company — if this aircraft was on the flight plan — that they are flight-planning over an area like that," Robert Francis, a former vice chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board told the Associated Press on Friday.

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What consequences will there be?

If it is determined that separatists acting completely on their own shot down the plane, it could spur an international alliance to go in and rout them out — but since Russia is almost certainly behind them, it’s doubtful anyone would want to start World War III just yet.

More likely, are even more of the sanctions that the U.S. and European Union have already levied on Russia.

"The new U.S. sanctions that the president put in place a few days ago are really in response to a view that Russia has not backed down at all, it has sent troops and it has sent specially weaponry, like these surface to air missiles to the separatists,” said Leiter. “So, from that perspective, the U.S. knows he’s been doubling down, the question now for the intelligence community will be: Is there any crack in that? Does he look at this situation and say this is so bad, that there might be an off-ramp to deescalate. I don’t think that’s the most likely outcome given Putin’s background, but I think there’s at least some chance, and that’s the leadership-intention piece that the US intelligence community will try to discern over the coming days.”

It is also possible that a case could be made to prosecute militia men, or even Russian officials, in the International Criminal Court for war crimes/crimes against humanity -- but Russia has never been a member (neither is the United States anymore) so they aren't subject to the court's jurisdiction.

“An ICC case is not impossible, but it is unlikely for both procedural and substantive reasons,” Rebecca Hamilton, an expert in international law who teaches at Columbia Law School, told NBC News.

The United Nations Security Council could conceivably try to punish Russian officials as well -- but Russia, of course, has veto power over anything the UNSC does.

First published July 19 2014, 1:49 AM

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Gaza Residents See Growing Toll in Israel Fight - Wall Street Journal

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Unlike 1st, Malaysia's 2nd disaster brings closure - Businessweek

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (AP) — Less than five months ago, they had rushed to Kuala Lumpur International Airport — anxious relatives with a hope in their hearts, however faint, that a missing jumbo jet with their loved ones had not crashed, and would eventually be found.

This week, throngs of relatives came again with no hope, just a chilling certainty that everyone on board another Malaysia Airlines had perished.

They shed tears, sobbed and looked for comfort to ease the all-too-familiar pain of loss that's visited a nation dealing with the second air disaster this year.

But the crash of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 that was downed over rebel-controlled eastern Ukraine is playing out in starkly different mood compared to the anguish surrounding Flight 370 that disappeared March 8.

CHAOS AND ANGER OF MH370:

In March, it took about four hours for Malaysia Airlines to announce that the Boeing 777 was missing while traveling from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 people on board.

The airport was soon overwhelmed with angry relatives screaming and begging for answers — and holding out hope that the plane had landed somewhere or their loved ones were still alive.

But the answers would not come. Not that day, and for many, not up until now.

Most of the passengers were from China, and the first batch of kin had arrived from Beijing on the third day of what has become the biggest aviation mystery in the world. Investigators announced that the plane had vanished from radar screens, flying for hours to the southern Indian Ocean where it was last traced by satellite pings.

That did little to calm the relatives, some of whom accused the Malaysian government of conspiracy, hiding the truth and ineptitude.

People were shouting. Crying hysterically. Pointing fingers at officials only to be met with blank stares.

DISORGANIZED OFFICIALS:

It took several days before the first news conference was organized to address the mystery of Flight 370. Several false leads followed, each punctured by high expectations then disappointment that turned into more anger and frustration.

The Chinese relatives were escorted to an airport hotel. Then transferred to another. They were finally asked to leave and wait for news at home.

Briefings by Malaysian officials were getting uglier by day. The Chinese families were storming out, accusing officials of not sharing relevant information.

Malaysian families, too, complained the briefings were useless and were being told what's already been reported in the news.

A Chinese mother, crying "My son! My son!" stormed a news conference by Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak after he solemnly read a statement that the plane had "ended in the southern Indian Ocean." She and others were not ready to close the book without evidence of wreckage.

MH17:

This Friday, and the airport was receiving crying relatives again.

This time, they knew the outcome of the disaster. The wreckage of the Boeing 777 was found, scattered over a Ukrainian field after a suspected missile shot it down. Most of the casualties were Dutch with 44 Malaysians, including 15 crew and two infants.

No one is wailing. No one is making a scene. There is no hope of anyone being found alive.

Counseling is set up immediately. The government addresses a stunned nation and the world without hours, at 4 a.m.

The relatives are briefed by a government minister. There is no storming out of the meeting.

The Malaysian government is not taking the blame. It falls on those responsible for shooting down the aircraft.

RELATIVES' ADVICE:

A social media account run by families of Flight 370 passengers posted 10 tips for relatives of those on Flight 17.

The tips include warnings to refrain from immediately contracting lawyers seeking business and to speak carefully to the media. It also advised the relatives to stick together and support each other.

"The most important thing is to stay with family members and friends, and with the relatives of other passengers," said the message on Chinese social network WeChat. "Doing that will bring you comfort, and we hope you'll suffer less than did the family members of 370."

___

Associated Press writer Jack Chang in Beijing contributed to this report.

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Huge Wildfires Bear Down on Two More Towns in Washington - NBCNews.com

Evacuations were ordered in two more small towns in central Washington on Friday as huge wildfires that already had burned scores of homes approached, emergency officials said. The latest evacuation warnings Friday night were to people on the outskirts of Brewster, a city of 2,400 just north along the Columbia River from Pateros, which was hit hard Thursday night by one of the fires in the Carlton Complex. Earlier Friday, most of the 500 residents of Malott were evacuated, Okanogan County Sheriff Frank Rogers told The Associated Press. Rogers later told the AP that at least one home burned in Malott but the threat to Brewster had eased.

Nearly 100 homes burned in Pateros and surrounding areas late Thursday and early Friday. Since they were ignited by lightning Monday, the Carlton Complex fire have burned 260 square miles, according to emergency officials. Smoke from those fires and another complex farther south has made air quality in Wenatchee, Leavenworth and other cities unhealthy, according to Chelan County Emergency Management. The smoke has extended 150 miles east to Spokane, the AP said.

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IN-DEPTH

Washington Wildfires Burn Homes, Force Evacuations

Gallery: Massive Wildfires Scorch 100 Homes in Washington

SOCIAL

— Gil Aegerter

First published July 18 2014, 9:47 PM

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Hamas resumes rocket fire after 5-hour cease-fire - Washington Post

A Palestinian girl walks with a toy that she salvaged from debris of the el-Yazje apartment building which was destroyed following an overnight Israeli missile strike in Gaza City, Thursday, July 17, 2014. The Israeli military says it has struck 37 targets in Gaza ahead of a five-hour humanitarian cease-fire meant to allow civilians to stock up after 10 days of fighting. The Gaza Interior Ministry says four people were killed and that a 75-year-old woman died of wounds from the day before. The Israeli army says Hamas fired 11 rockets at Israel early Thursday. Palestinian health officials say that in total, at least 225 Palestinians have been killed. On the Israeli side, one man was killed since July 8. (Lefteris Pitarakis/Associated Press)

By Associated Press July 17 at 10:54 AM

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip — Gaza residents rushed to banks, vegetable markets and shops Thursday during a first U.N.-brokered lull in 10 days of Israel-Hamas fighting, but a quick resumption of hostilities after it ended signaled that a permanent truce remains elusive.

Hamas fired 10 rockets at Israel after the end of the temporary truce, while Israel launched two airstrikes at the Gaza Strip, security officials said.

Egypt persisted with diplomatic efforts to bring all sides to the table Thursday, with President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi meeting with Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas after Egyptian officials met separately with representatives of Israel and Hamas in Cairo. But the gaps remain wide.

Israel accepted Egypt’s call earlier this week to halt all fighting, but Hamas rejected the idea because it first wants to lock in achievements, such as easing the seven-year blockade of Gaza by Israel and Egypt.

Palestinians in crowded Gaza say they often have nowhere to go when they're warned of Israeli airstrikes. (AP)

Strict Egyptian access restrictions to Gaza over the past year, combined with long-running Israeli closures, severely weakened the Islamic militant group.

During the humanitarian cease-fire, Gaza residents rushed to restock supplies after more than a week of being mostly holed up at home for fear of airstrikes.

“The situation is likely to get worse because there is no clear way out of it,” said Moussa Amran, 43, a money changer in central Gaza City.

The city’s streets returned to normalcy during the lull, with traffic jams, motorists honking horns and Hamas police directing traffic at busy intersections.

Hundreds lined up outside banks, with people jostling and shouting to get to ATM machines. In an outdoor market, shoppers filled plastic bags with fruit, vegetables and freshly slaughtered chickens.

Abdallah Jaber, 42, seized the opportunity to visit his 87-year-old father, Hosni, in a care facility for the elderly and disabled close to the Israeli border, in an area that has been targeted repeatedly by the Israeli army as a launching area for rockets.

Several tank shells hit the upper floors of the five-story Wafa rehabilitation center last week, punching large holes into the wall facing the border.

Funerals were held in Gaza for four boys who were killed by an Israeli airstrike while they were playing on a beach. Seven others were wounded in the strike, which a Palestinian activist said came from an Israeli naval vessel operating offshore. (AP)

Israel has demanded that the building be evacuated, but director Basman Ashi said such a trip was too risky for his 17 patients, many of them unable to walk.

Jaber said he couldn’t reach the center during 10 days of fighting and was worried about his father, who is on a respirator and suffers from dementia. “We would call every hour to get an update on his condition,” he said.

Israeli strikes have killed more than 230 Palestinians, Gaza Health Ministry spokesman Ashraf al-Kidra said. One Israeli has been killed and several wounded in rocket attacks, officials said.

Since July 8, Israel carried out nearly 2,000 airstrikes, while Hamas fired more than 1,300 rockets, reaching Israel’s economic and cultural heartland.

In Cairo, Egypt’s Foreign Minister Sameh Shukri insisted in an interview with The Associated Press that the cease-fire deal was still alive and expressed frustration that “Palestinian factions” -- a clear reference to Hamas -- had not agreed to it.

Hamas’ agreement is crucial to any such truce, but its demand that the blockade be eased significantly is likely to be rejected by Israel and Egypt because it would strengthen the group’s hold on Gaza, where it seized power in 2007.

On Wednesday, the No. 2 in Hamas, Moussa Abu Marzouk, presented a list of demands to Egypt, said a senior official in the group who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the negotiations with reporters.

Hamas demands that Gaza’s crossings be opened and that all types of goods be allowed into the territory. Israel has allowed consumer goods into Gaza, but has restricted construction material, fearing it would be diverted for military use. Israel has also barred most exports from Gaza, crippling the local economy.

Hamas also wants to be allowed to build a sea port as a gate to the world, with shipments under international monitoring, the Hamas official said.

In addition, Hamas demands the release of 52 activists who had been released by Israel in a 2011 prisoner swap, but were re-arrested in recent months.

A high-level Israeli delegation also visited Cairo for several hours on Wednesday to discuss the terms of a cease-fire, said Egyptian government officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.

Meanwhile, Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman dismissed a news report that a truce was to begin early Friday, saying that “as of now, at least, we are not aware of this.”

In the lead-up to Thursday’s lull, 13 heavily armed Hamas militants tried to sneak into Israel through a tunnel from Gaza, the military said. Israeli aircraft struck the fighters at the mouth of the tunnel some 250 meters (820 feet) inside Israel, near a kibbutz.

Lt. Col. Peter Lerner, a military spokesman, said the military believed at least one militant was killed in the strike and that the remaining fighters appeared to have returned to Gaza through the tunnel.

Footage released by the military showed a number of individuals creeping slowly toward what appeared to be a hole in the ground. A separate shot showed an explosion from an airstrike on the tunnel entrance.

Hamas’ military wing said all its fighters returned safely.

In fighting early Thursday, Israeli aircraft struck 37 targets in Gaza, including the homes of senior Hamas leaders Fathi Hamad and Khalil al-Haya, the military said.

Three people were killed by a tank shell that hit a house in the southern town of Rafah, the Hamas-run police and al-Kidra said.

In the town of Khan Younis, hundreds joined the funeral procession of four members of a family, including two children, who were killed in an air strike the day before. The bodies, wrapped in white shrouds, were carried through the streets.

In Jerusalem, a court indicted a 29-year-old and two 16-year-olds in the death of Mohammed Abu Khdeir, 16. According to the indictment, the suspects went out for a “manhunt” that ended when they “cruelly” killed Abu Khdeir.

The indictment said the suspects carried out the crime in revenge for the deaths of three Israeli teens last month and that they killed Abu Khdeir “solely because he was an Arab.” The suspects are also accused of attempting to kidnap a seven-year-old Arab boy a day earlier.

The indictment said Abu Khdeir was strangled, beaten and burned to death while he was unconscious.

The death led to days of clashes between Palestinian protesters and police in east Jerusalem and elicited widespread international condemnation.

___

Goldenberg reported from Jerusalem. Associated Press writers Ibrahim Barzak in Gaza City, Mohammed Daraghmeh in Ramallah, Aron Heller in Tel Aviv and Maggie Michael in Cairo contributed to this report.

Copyright 2014 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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FILE: Microsoft To Cut 18000 Jobs - Los Angeles Times

By Paresh Dave contact the reporter

Microsoft Corp. plans to cut up to 18,000 jobs over the next year, a 14% workforce reduction aimed at ditching management layers and building a more agile technology powerhouse.

The broadest layoffs in the company’s 39-year history, announced Thursday morning, surpassed expectations of analysts and observers for cuts of 6,000 to 12,000 employees.

About 12,500 of the layoffs will come during the next six months from Nokia’s mobile phone unit, which Microsoft purchased in April. The acquisition had swelled the Microsoft payroll from 99,000 to 127,000 employees worldwide. Both factory and professional jobs will be eliminated, including engineers at Nokia's office in San Diego.

The company didn’t detail where the other 6,000 position cuts would come from. But in a memo to employees Thursday, Chief Executive Satya Nadella emphasized that cutting bureaucracy is key.

“We will simplify the way we work to drive greater accountability, become more agile and move faster,” Nadella wrote. “As part of modernizing our engineering processes the expectations we have from each of our disciplines will change. In addition, we plan to have fewer layers of management, both top down and sideways, to accelerate the flow of information and decision making.”

The cuts will trigger a charge of $1.1 billion to $1.6 billion on the company's books to cover severance and benefit costs during the next year, Microsoft said.

In a note to clients, FBR Capital Market analysts Daniel Ives and James Moore said that while the cuts were “painful” for employees, they were certainly necessary considering all the duplication Nokia brought in the door.

“Microsoft needs to be a ‘leaner and meaner’ technology giant over the coming years in order to strike the right balance of growth and profitability around its cloud and mobile endeavors,” they said.

Microsoft, whose Windows operating system still powers most traditional computers, has fallen far behind that of Google and Amazon in bids to be the brains of smartphones, tablets and servers — the areas of computing showing the greatest growth.

Microsoft's only previous mass layoff came in 2009, when the company announced that a “once-in-a-lifetime set of economic conditions” had forced the more than 5,000 cuts, about 6% of the workforce at the time.

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Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times

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Gaza Ceasefire Ends as Cairo Talks Simmer - ABC News

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A temporary ceasefire in Gaza came to an end today as negotiators for Israel and Hamas worked with Egypt to find a way to create a permanent halt to the fighting.

The end of the five hour long truce was marked by the wail sirens in Ashkelon and Israeli settlements near the Gaza border. A rocket fired from Gaza struck near Ashkelon just as the "humanitarian pause" was officially over.

The break in the fighting was meant to allow civilians in Gaza to stock up on supplies and allow aid into the blockaded Detroit-sized enclave. Long lines quickly formed at ATMs in Gaza and the market area was bustling. The halt in the shelling was marred by a flurry of mortar shells lobbed at Israel from Gaza and an Israeli soldier was injured by a blast near the southern Gaza Strip. The Israeli forces held their fired except to respond with mortar fire after the soldier was wounded.

In Cairo, Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shukri told the Associated Press there was growing momentum for a permanent ceasefire put forward by Egypt. Israel had accepted the plan earlier this week, but the proposal was rejected by Hamas, the militant group that controls Gaza. Egypt hopes to be able to extend today's temporary truce into a ceasefire to allow further talks.

The 10-day battle has left 227 people dead. Only one of those were Israeli. The tragedy of the fighting was underlined Wednesday when four Palestinian boys, aged 9-11, were killed by Israeli shells while playing on a Gaza beach.

Israeli Strike Kills Four Boys Playing on Gaza Beach

Everything You Need to Know About the Conflict

Inside Tel Aviv's 'Situation Room'

The Israeli military said it thwarted an earlier attack by 13 Gaza militants who sneaked into Israel through a tunnel.

Lt. Col. Peter Lerner, a military spokesman, said the militants were identified about 820 feet inside Israel and were struck by Israeli aircraft. Lerner said the military believed at least one militant was killed in Thursday's strike. He said the remaining fighters appeared to have returned to Gaza through the tunnel.

This was the second time militants infiltrated Israel from Gaza. Israel killed four militants last week who entered from the sea.

Mohammed Talatene/Reuters

PHOTO: Palestinians carry the body of a boy whom medics said was killed by in Gaza City

President Obama said Wednesday that "we've all been heart broken by the violence" that has "men, women and children caught in the crossfire."

Israel, Palestine Conflict: Israeli Strike on Gaza Kills 4 Young Boys

The president said the United States "will use all of our diplomatic relationships to support closing a deal on a ceasefire."

Israel had halted its attacks for several hours earlier this week, but resumed its military campaign after Hamas fired dozens of rockets at Israel.

At least 1,685 people have been injured in Gaza since fighting broke out last week, the health officials said.

Khalil Hamra/AP Photo

PHOTO: Palestinians salvage what they can of their belongings from the rubble of their destroyed house following an early morning Israeli missile strike in Gaza City, July 16, 2014.

The battle has broken a two-year lull in hostilities between Israel and Hamas and was triggered by the slaying of three Israeli teens and revenge burning death of a Palestinian teen. Angry protests escalated to rocket launches and retaliatory air strikes.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Morgan Stanley profit more than doubles, beating estimates - Reuters

By Lauren Tara LaCapra and Tanya Agrawal

Thu Jul 17, 2014 8:54am EDT

The corporate logo of financial firm Morgan Stanley is pictured on a building in San Diego, California September 24, 2013.

Credit: Reuters/Mike Blake

(Reuters) - Wall Street bank Morgan Stanley's (MS.N) quarterly earnings more than doubled, beating market estimates, as stronger performances by its investment banking and wealth management businesses more than made up for a fall in revenue from bond trading.

Net income attributable to common shareholders rose to $1.86 billion, or 94 cents per share, in the second quarter from $803 million, or 41 cents per share, a year earlier.

The bank's net income figures exclude accounting adjustments to reflect the changing value of Morgan Stanley's own debt.

According to adjusted figures calculated by Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S, the company earned 60 cents per share, beating the average analyst estimate of 55 cents.

Morgan Stanley's shares were up 2 percent at $33.15 before the opening bell on Thursday. Up to Wednesday's close, the stock had risen 3.6 percent since the start of the year, just outperforming the KBW Bank Index .BKX.

Including an accounting adjustment, the bank said net revenue rose 1 percent to $8.61 billion.

"We are seeing momentum across our businesses, with particular strength in investment banking, equity sales & trading and wealth management ...," said Chief Executive James Gorman, who described the operating environment as "muted."

Revenue from fixed-income, currency and commodities (FICC) trading fell 12.3 percent to $1 billion as a lack of volatility discouraged trading during the quarter.

Goldman Sachs Group Inc (GS.N), JPMorgan Chase & Co (JPM.N) and Citigroup Inc (C.N) earlier reported that their revenue from FICC trading fell by 10-15 percent in the quarter.

Bank of America Corp (BAC.N), alone among the big U.S. banks, reported an increase in revenue from the business, helped by a slight pickup in activity late in the quarter.

Morgan Stanley, ranked No. 2 globally in mergers-and-acquisitions, benefited from a strong equities market in the quarter. Advisory revenue rose 26 percent to $418 million.

Revenue from equity underwriting rose 50 percent to $489 million, while debt underwriting revenue rose 26 percent to $525 million.

Revenue from the bank's fast-growing wealth management business rose 5 percent to $3.72 billion.

Unlike Goldman Sachs, its biggest rival, Morgan Stanley decided years ago to rely less on bond markets as a profit engine and focus instead on managing money for the wealthy.

The bank took its biggest step into the business by taking full control of brokerage Smith Barney from Citigroup, a process started in 2009 and completed a year ago.

Helped by cost cuts, pretax profit margins in the business increased to 21 percent in the second quarter, from 18.5 percent in the same quarter of 2013. Gorman aims to deliver margins of 22-25 percent by the end of 2015 if interest rates stay low.

Revenue from asset management fees rose 11 percent to $2.1 billion.

Revenue from stock trading was flat at $1.8 billion. Goldman Sachs' revenue from that business fell 13 percent to $1.61 billion.

(This version of the story corrects percentage decline in FICC revenue to 12.3 pct from 17 pct in paragraph 9; also corrects paragraph 6 to say net revenue included, not excluded, an accounting adjustment.)

(Reporting by Lauren Tara LaCapra and Tanya Agrawal; Editing by Ted Kerr)

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Gaza Militants Sneak Into Israel Ahead of Cease-Fire - ABC News

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The Israeli military says it thwarted an attack by 13 Gaza militants who sneaked into Israel through a tunnel, an incident that occurred hours before a cease-fire was slated to begin.

Lt. Col. Peter Lerner, a military spokesman, says the militants were identified some 820 feet inside Israel and were struck by Israeli aircraft. Lerner said the military believed at least one militant was killed in Thursday's strike. He says the remaining fighters appeared to have returned to Gaza through the tunnel.

This was the second time militants infiltrated Israel from Gaza. Last week Israel killed four militants who entered from the sea.

Israeli Strike Kills Four Boys Playing on Gaza Beach

Everything You Need to Know About the Conflict

Inside Tel Aviv's 'Situation Room'

The sides are slated to participate in a five-hour cease-fire from 10 a.m. local time Thursday (3 a.m. EST) until 3 p.m. (8 a.m. EST), with the break in attacks scheduled to allow humanitarian aid.

Israel, Palestine Conflict: Israeli Strike on Gaza Kills 4 Young Boys

"This humanitarian window is meant to allow the civilian population of the Gaza Strip to engage in resupply for their humanitarian needs," a statement from the Israel Defense Forces stated.

"Should the humanitarian window be exploited by Hamas or other terror organizations for the purpose of launching attacks against Israeli civilian or military targets the IDF will respond firmly and decisively," the statement said.

The willingness of Israel to halt its attack came after four Palestinian boys playing on a Gaza beach were killed by Israeli fire. Israel, which has contended that Hamas hides its rocket launchers and arsenals in populated areas, said it would look into the circumstances of the boys' deaths.

Mohammed Talatene/Reuters

PHOTO: Palestinians carry the body of a boy whom medics said was killed by in Gaza City

President Obama said Wednesday that "we've all been heart broken by the violence" that has "men, women and children caught in the crossfire."

The president said the U.S. "will use all of our diplomatic relationships to support closing a deal on a ceasefire."

There was no indication that Israel or Hamas, the militant group that controls Gaza, were willing to agree to a permanent ceasefire that had been proposed by Egypt earlier this week. Israel had halted its attacks for several hours earlier this week, but resumed its military campaign after Hamas fired dozens of rockets at Israel.

Khalil Hamra/AP Photo

PHOTO: Palestinians salvage what they can of their belongings from the rubble of their destroyed house following an early morning Israeli missile strike in Gaza City, July 16, 2014.

The death toll in the ten-day slugfest reached 227, all but one of them Palestinians, many of them civilians and children, according to Gaza health officials. At least 1,685 people have been injured in Gaza since fighting broke out last week, the health officials said.

The battle has broken a two-year lull in hostilities between Israel and Hamas and was triggered by the slaying of three Israeli teens and revenge burning death of a Palestinian teen. Angry protests escalated to rocket launches and retaliatory air strikes.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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US slaps toughest sanctions yet on Russia, targets Putin allies - Reuters

By Steve Holland and Elizabeth Piper

WASHINGTON/MOSCOW Thu Jul 17, 2014 2:48am EDT

A pro-Russian separatist from the Vostok (East) battalion stands guard near a T-64 tank in Donetsk, eastern Ukraine, July 16, 2014.

Credit: Reuters/Maxim Zmeyev

WASHINGTON/MOSCOW (Reuters) - President Barack Obama imposed the toughest U.S. sanctions yet on Russia, striking at the heart of Vladimir Putin's powerbase by targeting companies closest to him over what Washington says is Moscow's failure to curb violence in Ukraine.

By imposing penalties on Russia's largest oil producer Rosneft, its second largest gas producer Novatek and its third largest bank Gazprombank, Washington targeted Putin's allies, many of whom have become wealthy during his tenure.

The sanctions, which in effect close medium- and long-term dollar funding, were also put on Vnesheconombank, VEB, a state-owned bank that acts as payment agent for the government, and eight arms firms, including the producer of the Kalashnikov assault rifle.

The sanctions did not freeze those four companies' assets, or stop U.S. firms from doing business with them and several were quick to say it was business as usual. But Russia's rouble-traded stock market and the rouble tumbled on opening.

Rosneft and Novatek were heavily hit, with both down more than 5 percent. The MICEX index was off more than 3 percent.

In his harshest words yet about future ties with Washington, Putin said the sanctions would damage U.S. energy companies and bring relations to a "dead end." A Foreign Ministry official said Moscow would hit back in a way that would be "painful" for Washington.

The chief executive of Russia's VTB bank warned of potentially devastating consequences for the global financial system from sanctions which he called illegal, echoing the sentiment of several Russian business leaders.

"Of course, these sanctions are inappropriate and of course they do not correspond to the spirit or the legal standards of existing international relations, in particular in the field of finance and banking," Andrei Kostin, whose bank is Russia's second largest, was quoted as saying by Itar-Tass news agency.

"I believe that if we do not take measures to stop such unilateral actions, we could see devastating consequences for the global financial system."

EUROPE ON BOARD?

Obama, who warned of more sanctions if Russia did not take concrete steps to ease the conflict, said Putin had so far failed to take steps needed to resolve the crisis peacefully.

"We have emphasized our preference to resolve this issue diplomatically, but that we have to see concrete actions and not just words that Russia, in fact, is committed to trying to end this conflict along the Russia- Ukraine border," he said.

Washington said on Wednesday that up to 12,000 Russian combat forces were back on the border with Ukraine and that weaponry was crossing over to pro-Russian separatists.

Obama's latest round of sanctions came after close consultations with European leaders, who announced a less-ambitious package. The ultimate impact of the U.S. sanctions likely depends on whether the European Union follows suit.

It is the first time the United States has imposed such narrowly targeted measures as it seeks to inflict the maximum impact on Russia, dependent on oil revenues, while avoiding any immediate shock to global oil markets or U.S. and EU companies.

Both have already imposed several rounds of sanctions on senior Russian and Ukrainian officials since the start of the crisis, prompted when former pro-Moscow President Viktor Yanukovich was toppled from power in February and followed a month later by Russia's annexation of Crimea from Ukraine.

But Russian commentators suggested that many in the European Union were forced to support Washington's escalation and that business would suffer.

"The United States thinks that their policy of 'isolating Russia' will be payed for not just by themselves but by EU countries. In Europe, this is very well understood and not everyone is in agreement," Alexei Pushkov, a Putin loyalist and senior member of parliament, said on Twitter.

ALLIES IN FOCUS

But the measures put Putin's allies in focus. Rosneft is led by Igor Sechin, a friend of the Russian leaders since the 1990s and Novatek is run by Gennady Timchenko, who is said by political opponents to have been helped by Putin in creating his former Gunvor oil trading empire.

He sold his stake in that company just before another round of sanctions.

Gazprombank declined to comment.

Sechin, traveling with Putin in Brazil, rounded on the sanctions, saying they were "unjustified, subjective and unlawful, because the company has no role in the Ukraine crisis".

While not worried by earlier asset freezes and travel bans put on him personally, Sechin is increasingly upset over the sanctions, believing that he has done a lot to U.S. investors into Russia.

Rosneft is working with Exxon Mobil Corp on several big oil projects in Russia.

Novatek was not available for comment. VEB declined to comment.

It is not yet clear how large an impact the new measures will have on Rosneft, which had sales of $40 billion in the first quarter, about 8.6 percent of Russia's gross domestic product, or the companies it does business with.

The new sanctions would not appear to prevent Rosneft from selling its oil, but may raise questions about the company’s more than $15 billion worth of oil-related finance arrangements with companies including BP, which now owns almost a fifth of Rosneft, and Glencore.

Morgan Stanley, which is selling the majority of its global physical oil trading operations to Rosneft, declined to comment.

The sanctions stopped short of targeting Russia's Gazprom, the world's largest natural gas producer and provider of much of Europe's energy supplies. Gazprombank is 36 percent-owned by Gazprom.

(Additional reporting by Jeff Mason, Patricia Zengerle and Phil Stewart in Washington, Adrian Croft in Brussels and Josephine Mason, Edward McAllister, and Jonathan Leff in New York; and by Katya Golubkova and Polina Devitt in Moscow, Writing by Elizabeth Piper, Editing by Timothy Heritage)

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