TV News LIES

Connecticut, Georgia, Idaho, Massachusetts, Michigan, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Texas and Puerto Rico also saw an increase in the spread of the virus, landing them in the “moderate” tier.

New York City, which reports as a separate jurisdiction from the rest of the state, moved into the most severe category for “very high” flu activity.

Much of this season’s flu activity is being driven by a new variant of influenza called subclade K. The subclade is a type of H3N2 influenza, which has historically caused more hospitalizations and deaths.

It’s not too late to boost your protection against the virus. “CDC recommends that every 6 months and older who has not yet been vaccinated this season get an annual influenza (flu) vaccine,” the agency said Friday.

The CDC said it has distributed 127 million doses so far.

More...

Denmark's intelligence service for the first time has described the United States as a potential threat to its and the wider European region's national security because of the Trump administration's apparent willingness to use economic and military coercion and pressure "to enforce its will," even against allies.

"The world's great powers are increasingly prioritizing their own interests and use force to achieve their goals," the NATO country's military intelligence agency said in its annual threats assessment, published on Dec. 10. The Danish Defense Intelligence Service named Russia and China among the chief nations posing challenges to Denmark and Europe. But in an unusual move, it also singled out the United States because of what it said was "uncertainty" about "the role of the United States as a guarantor of European security."

"The United States uses economic power, including in the form of threats of high tariffs, to enforce its will and no longer excludes the use of military force even against allies," the report said.

The U.S. Embassy in Copenhagen referred all questions on the Danish intelligence report to the U.S. State Department, which did not immediately respond to a comment request.

Tensions between Copenhagen and Washington have soured amid President Donald Trump's stated interest in taking control of Greenland, a resource-rich, strategically important Arctic island that's part of the kingdom of Denmark.

More...

Torrential rain swept across the Gaza Strip on Thursday, flooding hundreds of tents sheltering families displaced by two years of war and leading to the death of a baby girl due to exposure, local health officials said.

Medics said eight-month-old Rahaf Abu Jazar died of exposure to cold after water inundated her family’s tent in Khan Younis, in the south of the enclave.

Weeping and holding Rahaf in her hands, her mother Hejar Abu Jazar said she had fed the girl before they went to sleep.

“When we woke up, we found the rain over her and the wind on her, and the girl died of cold suddenly,” she told Reuters.

“There was nothing wrong with her. Oh, the fire in my heart, the fire in my heart, oh my life,” she said in tears.

Municipal and civil defense officials said they were unable to cope with the storm because of fuel shortages and damage to equipment.

They said Israel destroyed hundreds of vehicles, including bulldozers and others used to pump water, during the war, which displaced most of the over two million population and left much of Gaza in ruins.

More...

The US’s sharpening ideological polarization is affecting a wider and much more junior cross-section of the country’s armed forces and challenging the military’s ability to remain above the political fray, a former chairman of the joint chiefs of staff has said.

Retired Adm Mike Mullen, who was the US’s top military commander under presidents George W Bush and Barack Obama, called the political environment facing currently serving officers “challenging” and “the most dangerous time” in his memory.

Speaking at a security forum organized by the Aspen Institute thinktank on Wednesday, he warned that it had become much harder to maintain the armed forces’ traditional apolitical stance than when he served as joint chiefs chair between 2007 and 2011.

“I didn’t really understand how hard [the civilian-military relationship] was until I was in the middle of it,” he said. “I talked about the military being apolitical a lot in those four year and it’s only gotten harder. We have gotten so much more divided.”

Mullen’s comments follow accusations that the Trump administration has consciously sought to politicize the military by purging senior commanders and by deploying national guard units on unaccustomed law and order missions in American cities, including Washington DC, to counteract supposed “crime waves”.

More...

A US judge on Wednesday morning blocked the deployment by the federal government of national guard troops in Los Angeles and ordered the guard returned to the control of the California governor, a court filing showed.

The Trump administration is being challenged in federal court over its authority and ratio

In a historically rare move, the Trump administration federalized California’s national guard in June, dispatching about 4,000 troops in response to protests in the city over immigration raids, despite opposition from the state’s Democratic governor, Gavin Newsom, who quickly filed a lawsuit on behalf of the state.

Newsom called the move unprecedented and illegal, and the case has been unfolding in the courts for months.

On Wednesday, the US district judge Charles Breyer rejected the Trump administration’s claim that recent protests against aggressive enforcement by the federal immigration authorities amounted to a rebellion.

More...

nale for continuing to maintain command over the national guard troops it deployed to the city earlier this year.

In a historically rare move, the Trump administration federalized California’s national guard in June, dispatching about 4,000 troops in response to protests in the city over immigration raids, despite opposition from the state’s Democratic governor, Gavin Newsom, who quickly filed a lawsuit on behalf of the state.

Newsom called the move unprecedented and illegal, and the case has been unfolding in the courts for months.

On Wednesday, the US district judge Charles Breyer rejected the Trump administration’s claim that recent protests against aggressive enforcement by the federal immigration authorities amounted to a rebellion.

On July 20, around ten masked men raided the Palestinian hamlet of Ibsiq in the northern Jordan Valley in the occupied West Bank. They arrived in a two car convoy, dressed in Israeli military-issue fatigues, and carried assault rifles fitted with green laser pointers.

While their vehicles blocked the road, they stormed into a cluster of homes. At gunpoint, they forced a Palestinian family to their knees and warned them they had 48 hours to evacuate Area C and go to Area B—referring to technical designations of control in the West Bank under the Oslo Accords. Area C is under full Israeli control and Area B is technically under Palestinian civil administration but shares security control with Israel. The masked men said they would “return and burn the community down,” if the family did not evacuate to Area B.

I had been staying with an elderly Palestinian couple for five days in Ibsiq to document settler violence amid rising threats against the community. As the men approached, I asked one of them who he was. They looked like soldiers, but the vehicles in which they arrived had yellow civilian license plates. These masked assailants were members of the hagmar— settler reservist militias formally attached to the Israeli army and tasked with “security” in West Bank settlements.

The men dragged me behind a fence where four of them beat me until I required hospitalization. They stole the phone of an International Solidarity Mission activist who tried to record the attack.

My host, Abu Safi, who was 84, had little choice but to leave his home after that raid by the hagmar. The family packed up their belongings accumulated over decades in the house and moved to a nearby location in Area B. Abu Safi died of a heart attack soon afterwards.

More...

Grammy-nominated singer Jubilant Sykes was stabbed to death at his home in Santa Monica, California, and his son was arrested on suspicion of murder, authorities said Tuesday.

Officers responded to a 911 call Monday night reporting an assault in progress at the residence in the coastal city west of Los Angeles, according to a statement from the Santa Monica Police Department.

They found Sykes, 71, inside with critical stab wounds. Paramedics arrived and pronounced him dead at the scene, police said.

The victim’s son, 31-year-old Micah Sykes, was at the home and taken into custody without incident, police said. It wasn’t immediately known if he has an attorney.

Police recovered a weapon and the investigation was ongoing.

Jubilant Sykes was nominated for best classical album at the 2010 Grammy Awards for “Bernstein: Mass,” in which he performed the Celebrant role.

More...