Kerry’s ‘one state’ comments cause consternation in Israel
Kerry’s ‘one state’ comments cause consternation in Israel
JERUSALEM — U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry set off an uproar in Israel on Sunday after warning that the country, through its continued West Bank occupation, will become a “binational state.”
Kerry’s words describe a scenario that would mark a failure of U.S. policy and end to Israel’s existence as a country that is both Jewish and democratic. The U.S., the international community and many Israelis have endorsed the “two-state solution” — establishing a Palestinian state and ending Israel’s control over millions of Palestinians in territories occupied in the 1967 war.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared Sunday that “Israel will not be a binational state” and blamed the Palestinians for the failure of peace efforts. But despite Netanyahu’s pledges, Jewish settlement of the West Bank continues apace, while confusion over his true intentions grows by the day.
Meanwhile, Israel seems unable to stem a wave of stabbings and other attacks by Palestinian individuals, now in its third month, that has killed 19 Israelis and left over 100 Palestinians, most said by Israel to be attackers, dead.
This situation has sharpened the country’s half-century-old debate over the Palestinians. Opposition politicians, intellectuals and retired military commanders are issuing increasingly strident warnings that never-ending violence awaits if Israel continues to occupy millions of angry Palestinians who cannot vote in its national elections.
1st US shipment in months flying to space station
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — A U.S. shipment of much-needed groceries and other astronaut supplies rocketed toward the International Space Station for the first time in months Sunday, reigniting NASA’s commercial delivery service.
If the Orbital ATK capsule arrives at the space station Wednesday as planned, it will represent the first U.S. delivery since spring.
“Santa is on his way!” Tory Bruno, president of rocket maker United Launch Alliance, announced via Twitter.
More than anyone, perhaps, the six space station astronauts were thrilled following all the weather-related delays. They managed to photograph the rising rocket from their windows as both craft sailed over the Atlantic. “Caught something good on the horizon,” commander Scott Kelly reported in a tweet.
To NASA’s relief, the weather cooperated after three days of high wind and cloudy skies that kept the Atlas V rocket firmly on the ground. Everything came together on the fourth launch attempt, allowing the unmanned Atlas to blast off with 7,400 pounds of space station cargo, not to mention some Christmas presents for the awaiting crew.
Scientists enlist the big gun to get climate action: Faith
PARIS — The cold hard numbers of science haven’t spurred the world to curb runaway global warming. So as climate negotiators struggle in Paris, some scientists who appealed to the rational brain are enlisting what many would consider a higher power: the majesty of faith.
It’s not God versus science, but followers of God and science together trying to save humanity and the planet, they say.
Physicist John Schellnhuber, founder of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany, said he has been coming to these international talks for 11 years and essentially seen negotiators throw up their hands and say “sorry guys we tried our best.” And no one protested. But this time, with the power of Pope Francis’ encyclical earlier this year calling global warming a moral issue and an even more energized interfaith community, Schellnhuber feels the world’s faithful are watching and will hold world leaders accountable.
“They know they will be measured against the encyclical,” Schellnhuber, a member of the Vatican’s Pontifical Academy of Sciences, said Saturday at a Catholic Church event. Ever the scientist, Schellnhuber said on Saturday he hadn’t seen any evidence yet during the first week of negotiations that this will happen, but he has faith it will.
In the first five days of climate negotiations, interfaith activists came, fasted, talked to media, buttonholed leaders and prayed. On Saturday night in a downtown Paris chapel, hundreds of people, many of them prostrated on the ground, sang and prayed for the climate negotiators and mostly for the world.
Justice Department to investigate Chicago police
CHICAGO — The U.S. Justice Department is expected to launch a wide-ranging investigation this week into the patterns and practices of the Chicago Police Department after recent protests over a video showing a white Chicago police officer shooting a black teenager 16 times, according to a person familiar with the matter.
The person was not authorized to discuss the investigation publicly before it was announced and spoke Sunday to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.
The civil rights probe would follow others recently in Baltimore and Ferguson, Missouri, and come as the police department and Mayor Rahm Emanuel are under intense scrutiny over their handling of the October 2014 death of 17-year-old Laquan McDonald. Officer Jason Van Dyke was charged with first-degree murder Nov. 24, more than a year after the killing and just hours before the release of police dashboard camera footage showing the officer shooting the teenager.
The video shows McDonald veering away from officers on a four-lane street when Van Dyke, seconds after exiting his squad car, opens fire from close range. The officer continues shooting after McDonald crumples to the ground and is barely moving. The video does not include sound, which authorities have not explained.
The Chicago City Council signed off on a $5 million settlement with McDonald’s family even before the family filed a lawsuit, and city officials fought in court for months to keep the video from being released publicly. The city’s early efforts to suppress its release coincided with Emanuel’s re-election campaign, when the mayor was seeking African-American votes in a tight race.
San Bernardino mourns its dead, calls for unity
SAN BERNARDINO, Calif. — At a church, a mosque, a makeshift street-corner memorial and other sites, they gathered Sunday to mourn the 14 victims of the San Bernardino massacre and lament that the community has now been added to the tragic list of U.S. cities scarred by terrible violence.
Residents struggled to come to terms with the violence and hoped the community would unite in mourning and not be divided by the disclosure that the killers were a religious Muslim couple.
“It’s unfortunate that we’re on this list now, a list like Newtown, Aurora and others where such tragic events occurred,” Rep. Pete Aguilar, D-Calif., told a crowd at a mosque. “It’s not how I want San Bernardino remembered.”
By wire sources.