World

Storms encase Iowa and eastern Nebraska in ice and generate rare tornado warning in San Francisco

Published

2 hours ago

December 14, 2024

Storms encase Iowa and eastern Nebraska in ice and generate rare tornado warning in San Francisco

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — A major ice storm created treacherous driving conditions across Iowa and eastern Nebraska this weekend and prompted temporary closures of Interstate 80 after numerous cars and trucks slid off the road.

Many events were canceled across the region when the storm hit Friday evening and businesses announced plans to open late Saturday as officials urged people to stay home if possible. However, temperatures are expected to rise high enough Saturday afternoon to melt the ice in most places.

“Luckily some warmer air is moving in behind this to make it temporary,” said National Weather Service meteorologist Dave Cousins, who works in the Davenport, Iowa office.

Elsewhere, a storm prompted a rare tornado warning in San Francisco and caused some damage. And in the Northeast, people are digging out after heavy snow fell in upstate New York.

Some trees were toppled and roofs were damaged in the city that hasn’t seen a tornado since 2005, according to the Weather Service. The damage will be assessed later Saturday to determine if there was a tornado.

The fast-moving storm prompted warnings for residents to take shelter, but few people have basements in the area. Meteorologist Dalton Behringer said “the biggest thing that we tell people in the city is to put as many walls between you and the outside as possible.”

More than 33 inches (84 centimeters) of snow was reported near Orchard Park, New York, but people who live there are used to dealing with heavy lake-effect snow this time of year.

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Associated Press reporter Julie Walker contributed to this story from New York.

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World

Turkey seeks to purge pro-US Kurdish force that helped defeat Islamic State in Syria

Published

3 hours ago

December 14, 2024

Press Room

Turkey seeks to purge pro-US Kurdish force that helped defeat Islamic State in Syria

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JERUSALEM — Just hours after meeting with Secretary of State Antony Blinken and discussing the fight against the Islamic State in Syria, Turkey’s foreign minister sent a shocking message to Washington by saying his country’s goal is to eliminate the main fighting force of the Syrian Kurds, which defeated ISIS in tandem with the U.S..

According to Turkish media, Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said in a live broadcast on NTV that “the elimination of YPG is [Turkey’s] strategic goal.” He also noted the country’s Kurds must be protected.

Asked about Fidan’s comments, the State Department referred Fox News Digital to comments made earlier on Friday after Blinken’s meeting with Fidan in Turkey.

The statement said, in part, “Secretary Blinken emphasized the importance of U.S.-Turkish cooperation in the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS mission in Syria.”

SYRIAN DICTATOR BASHAR ASSAD FLEES INTO EXILE AS ISLAMIST REBELS CONQUER COUNTRY

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken meets with Turkish Minister of Foreign Affairs Hakan Fidan Dec. 13, 2024, in Ankara, Turkey. (Getty Images)

The U.S. has a long-standing military alliance with the Syrian Kurdish military organization, The People’s Defense Units (YPG), in Syria. The YPG is part of a broader organization known as the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and played a key role in dismantling the Islamic State in Syria.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has seized on the collapse of Syrian dictator Bashar Assad’s rule to gobble up territory controlled by the pro-American Syrian Kurds, risking hard-won gains against the Islamist State terrorist movement.

Erdoğan’s campaign to purge the SDF in northern Syria has created a dangerous security situation in the fight against the Islamic State (ISIS), according to Gen. Mazloum Abdi, the SDF’s commander in chief.

In an exclusive interview Thursday, Mazloum told Fox News’ Jennifer Griffin, “We are still under constant attack from the Turkish military and the Turkish-supported opposition, which is called SNA. Eighty drone attacks a day we have from the Turkish military. There is intensive artillery shells. This situation has paralyzed our counterterror operation.”

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan speaks to attendees during a rally to show solidarity with the Palestinians in Istanbul, Turkey, Oct. 28. (AP/Emrah Gurel)

Islamic State prisoners held in SDF-run detention camps could escape amid the military offensive launched by pro-Turkish forces against the SDF. The SDF has redirected much of its force capability and resources to blunt an aggressive Turkish-backed military offensive.

In 2022, Fox News Digital reported that Erdoğan’s slated invasion of northern Syria could open the floodgates for the release of as many 10,000 Islamic State fighters.

The U.S. on Wednesday brokered a cease-fire between the pro-Turkey Syrian National Army (SNA), the Syrian opposition (TSO) and the SDF.

Syrian Kurdish security forces stand by as former detainees suspected of being members of the Islamic State are released in Syria’s northeastern city of Hasakeh Sept. 2, 2024. (Delil Souleimani/AFP via Getty Images)

FALL OF SYRIA’S BASHAR ASSAD IS STRATEGIC BLOW TO IRAN AND RUSSIA, EXPERTS SAY

The U.S. has about 900 troops stationed in northeast Syria who coordinate with the SDF to prevent the resurgence of the Islamic State after the new wave of Turkish attacks against the Syrian Kurds.

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., warned the Turks on X, posting, “In the past I have drafted sanctions targeting Turkey if they engage in military operations against the Kurdish forces who helped President Trump destroy ISIS. I stand ready to do this again in a bipartisan way.

“We should not allow the Kurdish forces — who helped us destroy ISIS on President Trump’s watch — to be threatened by Turkey or the radical Islamists who have taken over Syria.”

Fox News Digital attempted to contact various Turkish officials, including its embassy spokespeople in Washington and Tel Aviv and its United Nations mission in New York.

“We have time and again pointed out threats against our national security, posed by the PKK/YPG terrorist network in Syria and Iraq,” Turkish diplomats previously told Fox News Digital about the Kurdish military forces PKK and YPG. PKK is an abbreviation for the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, an organization classified by the U.S. as a terrorist entity.

Displaced Kurds leave a refugee camp in the north of Aleppo, fleeing to Afrin, Dec. 4, 2024. (Ugur Yildirim/DIA Images/Abaca/Sipa USA via AP Images)

Efrat Aviv, a professor in the Department of General History at Bar-Ilan University in Israel and a leading expert on Turkey, told Fox News Digital, “Turkey’s actions in Syria further complicate the situation and hinder international efforts to bring about a comprehensive resolution to the conflict. The withdrawal of Turkish forces from the region and the cessation of conflicts with the Kurds could contribute to improving regional stability and efforts to end ISIS terrorism.

TURKEY’S INVASION THREATS SHOULD BE TAKEN ‘VERY SERIOUSLY’: CYPRUS OFFICIAL

“Turkey’s military actions in Syria jeopardize regional stability and undermine efforts to end ISIS terrorism. The Turkish strikes not only harm the Kurds, but also exacerbate the humanitarian situation in the region, causing significant population displacement.”

Uzay Bulut, a Turkish-born political analyst, told Fox News Digital, “Erdoğan’s imperial ambition in Syria has not changed. Land grab and demographic change have always been Turkey’s plan in Syria. Turkey’s military campaigns against Syria have brought nothing but instability to the region and severe persecution of minorities.

“To prevent further abuses, massacres or forced displacements against Christians, Kurds and Yazidis and to stop the spread of jihadism in the region, the Trump administration should get involved diplomatically to protect religious and ethnic minorities, particularly defenseless Christians, in Syria.”

The entrance of the Kweyris military airfield in the eastern part of Aleppo province Dec. 3, 2024, shows a portrait of Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad and a national flag in a dumpster after the takeover of the area by rebel groups. (Rami Al Sayed/AFP via Getty Images)

Syria’s Christian population could be as low as 2.5%, down from 10% before the civil war started in 2011. Christian and other ethnic and religious minorities face persecution from the radical Islamist Sunni terrorist organization Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) and its extremist allies.

“The ongoing jihadist assault against Syrian Kurds and Christians is led by the al Qaeda offshoot, HTS,” Bulut said. “HTS forces are backed by the government of Turkey and have brutalized and displaced religious minority communities in Idlib since 2017. HTS aims to install Islamic rule in Syria.”

The Trump transition team did not respond to Fox News Digital press queries.

When asked by Fox News Digital if the U.S. was contemplating sanctioning Turkey, a State Department spokesperson said, “As a general matter, we do not preview sanctions.”

On his trip to the region Friday, Secretary of State Antony Blinken met his Turkish counterpart, and the two discussed the latest developments in the area.

A readout of their meeting noted in part that Blinken “reiterated calls for all actors in Syria to respect the human rights and fundamental freedoms of all Syrians, including members of minority groups, and to prevent Syria from being used as a base for terrorism.”

World

Saudi-hosted UN talks fail to produce deal to tackle global drought

Published

3 hours ago

December 14, 2024

Press Room

Saudi-hosted UN talks fail to produce deal to tackle global drought

A future global drought regime is now planned to be completed at COP17 in Mongolia in 2026.

The 12-day meeting of parties to the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD), known as COP16, has ended in Saudi Arabia’s capital Riyadh without an agreement on responding to drought.

The talks follow a stream of failed talks on climate change issues, including biodiversity talks in Colombia and plastics pollution talks in South Korea, as well as a climate finance deal that disappointed developing countries at COP29 in Azerbaijan.

The biennial talks have attempted to create strong global mandates on climate change, requiring nations to fund early warning systems and build resilient infrastructure in poorer countries, particularly in Africa.

UNCCD Executive Secretary Ibrahim Thiaw said on Saturday that “parties need more time to agree on the best way forward”.

A news release stated that the parties – 196 countries and the European Union – had “made significant progress in laying the groundwork for a future global drought regime, which they intend to complete at COP17 in Mongolia in 2026”.

Droughts “fuelled by human destruction of the environment” cost the world more than $300bn each year, the UN said in a report published on December 3, the second day of the talks in Riyadh.

Droughts are projected to affect 75 percent of the world’s population by 2050, the report said.

Divide between Global South and North

A delegate at COP16 from a country in Africa, speaking on condition of anonymity, told the AFP news agency that African countries had hoped the talks would produce a binding protocol on drought.

That would ensure “every government will be held responsible” for devising stronger preparation and response plans, the delegate said.

“It’s the first time I’ve seen Africa so united, with a strong united front, with respect to the drought protocol.”

Two other anonymous COP16 participants told the agency that developed countries did not want a binding protocol and instead were vying for a “framework”, which African countries deemed inadequate.

Indigenous groups were also pushing for a binding protocol, according to Praveena Sridhar, chief technical officer for Save Soil, a global campaign backed by UN agencies.

Meanwhile, host Saudi Arabia, one of the world’s largest oil producers, has been criticised in the past for stalling progress on curbing emissions from fossil fuels at other negotiations.

At the talks on Saturday, Saudi Environment Minister Abdulrahman al-Fadley said the kingdom has launched several initiatives to address desertification, a major issue for the country.

Saudi Arabia is dedicated “to working with all parties to preserve ecosystems, enhance international cooperation to combat desertification and land degradation, and address drought”, he said.

In advance of the Riyadh talks, the UNCCD said 1.5 billion hectares (3.7 billion acres) of land must be restored by the end of the decade and that at least $2.6 trillion in global investments was needed.

World

Who is Han Duck-soo, South Korea's acting president after Yoon impeachment?

Published

10 hours ago

December 14, 2024

Press Room

Who is Han Duck-soo, South Korea's acting president after Yoon impeachment?

Prime Minister Han Duck-soo, who became South Korea’s acting president after Saturday’s impeachment of Yoon Suk Yeol, is a career technocrat whose wide-ranging experience and reputation for rationality could serve him well in his latest role.